


Making It Better

by sideris



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post Reichenbach, speculative fic, will probably be AU when S3 airs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-24
Updated: 2013-06-09
Packaged: 2017-11-12 19:15:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 96,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/494727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sideris/pseuds/sideris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>John’s sure there’s something he ought to say to that, some question that needs to be asked and answered, but it’s hard to think straight because Sherlock has wormed a hand under his jumper now, and is busily tugging the bottom of John's shirt free of his trousers, fingertips dancing over skin that hasn’t been touched by anyone else for a whole year, and - god - they’re Sherlock’s fingertips, and-</i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>- and how the hell is that even possible?</i></p><p> </p><p> Returning to London, and his old life, proves harder and more dangerous than Sherlock expected.</p><p> <br/><b>WARNING:</b> Please note I have chosen not to give any warnings and only limited tags. <b>The story may contain triggers</b> for some readers, so please be aware of that.</p><p>This story was conceived before any details of S3 were known. The explanation for Sherlock’s return is based on guesswork and Arthur Conan Doyle’s original canon. Which means a lot of it is now AU!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lacerations

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to verilyvexed for betaing and to [consultingpiskies.tumblr.com](http://consultingpiskies.tumblr.com/) for the cover art.

  


  


**_Tuesday, February 19th 2013_ **

 

 

The day has been a warm one for the time of year and, now that the wind has changed to a southerly, coming up from the Mediterranean, the late afternoon air has a faintly salty tang to it. It's still light, bright even, and sunlight on the building opposite - one of most elegant in the Place de la Comédie, despite its now being a McDonald’s - is making the blond sandstone glow. Meanwhile, across the square, a tram rattles past, and a group of children, playing near the Trois Graces sculpture, splash each other with water from the fountains to loud shrieks of laughter.

(It’s hateful.)

(Boring.)

( _France_ is boring.) (All of it.) (Especially Montpellier.) (And a whole month of research into tartrazine has been tedious beyond belief.) (Seriously - what else does France Chimie Charbonnière think remains to be discovered about the stuff?)

Sherlock sighs heavily, because he’s doomed to stay put - at least, until Mycroft gives him the all clear. Were it only his own safety as stake, he might risk returning to London regardless, but it’s not; it’s Mrs Hudson’s, and Lestrade’s, and most importantly of all, John’s.

(John.)

Just the thought of him sends a pulse of desire through Sherlock, and he finds himself shifting about on his hard wicker chair, seized by a sudden and urgent need to move his pelvis. It’s undignified, _animal_ even, and to quell it, he takes a hurried sip of the Café du Théâtre’s famously sophisticated coffee. It’s good, amongst the best he’s ever tasted, but he’d rather have coffee made by John any day. Right now though, that’s impossible, and to distract himself from dwelling on the resentment rising up in him, Sherlock turns his attention to the man basking in the early evening sunshine at the next table: broad shoes, with inelegant soles (he's not French); well-cut suit, neat hair and manicured nails (affluent); heavy thighs, belly and buttocks (office worker of some kind); a sharp tan line- 

Sherlock’s phone buzzes and starts twitching across the tabletop. He picks it up.

_Text: Operation Horus is go. Await further instructions. MH_

Sherlock glares at the screen. This isn’t what he was waiting for. He types in a furious response. 

_Text: Where’s my picture? SH_

A couple of seconds pass during which a pair of young women, beautifully groomed and arm-in-arm, catch the attention of his neighbour who casts them an appreciative though furtive glance (he’s married, happily so - for the most part), then Sherlock’s phone buzzes again.

_Text: You’re not getting one. Not when your life is in danger. MH_

(Hell. Not _this_ again.) Sherlock clenches his teeth.

_Text: Remind me: how many times have photos proved fatal? SH_

_Text: Situation critical. You can't come back yet. MH_

_Text: There are others I could ask. SH_

A full minute passes before Mycroft replies.

_Text: I can’t stop you. But you’re my brother. I won’t be instrumental in causing you more pain. MH_

Sherlock stares at the screen in disbelief. (More pain? What does he mean? There’s nothing that could hurt worse than having had to leave John behind. Nothing worse than hurting _him_.) (Except when …) Sherlock’s belly tightens and another tingle of desire goes through him. (Damn it. I need to go home.)

He picks up his phone again, taps in another message.

_Text: New mission, Billy. John Watson. Any and all information. Photographs where possible. Urgent. SH_

 

* * * * * * * *

 

 

**_Saturday, 23rd February_ **

 

A newly purchased mole wrench in hand, John regards the leaking kitchen sink in his new flat with grim determination. Pipes, he tells himself, are just like veins: seal one off, and the blood stops flowing in that particular direction and has to take an alternative route. Thus, fixing a dripping pipe should be simple. Seal off the broken bit, replace it, and reconnect. Simple.

He plonks himself down on the tiled floor, twists around and lowers himself onto his back so that he can wriggle in under the sink. Then, seizing the U-bend with his wrench, he gives it a twist, eyes firmly closed in case something goes wrong and he ends up under a deluge of dirty water and half-rotten vegetable shavings.

Of course, it’s at this very moment that the phone rings - the landline, not his mobile. For a while, he ignores it, but it keeps ringing, long enough that he starts wondering if the hospital is short-staffed and needs him to go in. Leaving the wrench still clamped around the pipe, he slithers back out from under the sink and goes to answer the call.

“Hello?”

“Good afternoon, sir. Am I talking to Doctor John H Watson?”

“Yes ..” John replies warily, not recognizing the voice. “Who’s that?”

“I’m calling you from HPI, sir,” the voice at the other end says. “Healthcare Professionals Insurance. Whatever your current insurers are offering, we can do better in terms of monthly payments, benefits and terms and conditions.”

John curses inwardly. He’s been meaning to get this number registered with the Telephone Preference Service for weeks but, what with one thing and another, it slipped his mind. Adjusting to a whole new lifestyle has been harder than he’d expected; his therapist’s finances must have improved dramatically. Unlike his own.

“I’m happy with what I’ve got, thanks,” he says, bracing himself for argument, and resolving to just put the receiver down and cut the person on the other end off if one starts.

But there is no argument. Just a cheerful, “Well, thank you for your time, Doctor, and if you should ever change your mind, please do give us a call. We’re in the phone book.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Saturday, February 23rd - five minutes later_ **

 

 

_Text: He’s got a flat. South of the river. East Dulwich. Address to follow. B_

_Text: Good work. SH_

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Thursday, February 28th - mid afternoon_ **

 

 

It’s raining, absolutely pissing it down, and John’s hair is so wet, it’s plastered to his scalp, funnelling bitterly cold water down under his collar and into his shirt. Glad he’s heading for home, rather than on his way into work, he dodges a puddle, treads on a dodgy paving stone and sends a spurt of grubby water right up the back of his trouser leg.

“It’s about time the bloody universe took into account the fact I’m one of the good guys,” he mutters, attempting to shake the affected leg dry until it strikes him that he must look like a dog taking a leak. “Jesus - can’t even hang on to my dignity.”

Still, at least he’s not the only one. Everyone around him looks like a drowned rat too, except for the superior few brandishing umbrellas, and threatening to take people’s eyes out with them as they barge past, oblivious to the fact it’s _fucking difficult_ to see where you’re going with rain dripping from your brows into your eyes.

Traffic roars by - cars, buses, lorries and even bikes - sending up huge sprays of water and giving the rain that's already fallen a second shot at soaking pedestrians. And, god, the noise! So much worse in the rain, blurring the aural cues John usually uses to help him negotiate his way through London traffic.

In front of him, a little group of people stands huddled on the kerb, hunched against the weather and waiting for the lights to change. As John reaches them, a gap in the traffic appears, but he’s not fooled - you never see the traffic approaching from Leake Street until it’s right on top of you. However, a dark and lanky teenage boy _is_ fooled, and he steps off the pavement right into the path of a car that's just turned the corner. By some miracle, the kid manages to leap backwards out of its way but, thrown completely off balance, he goes over, falling awkwardly sideways onto the pavement. A cry of alarm goes up, one that gathers volume when the kid doesn’t move.

For a moment, the nightmare resurfaces, but John forces it back down again. Then, there was nothing he could do but watch; now, he’s sure there must be _something_.

“Let me through,” he orders, ploughing his way through the gawping bystanders. “Let me through; I’m a doctor.”

At his approach, the boy groans and tries to stand but John drops to his haunches beside him, urging caution. “Easy! Take your time. There’s no rush. Get your breath back first.”

A pair of shrewd blue eyes dart about his face, and for a moment, John thinks he sees recognition in them, but just as quickly, it’s gone again. He hopes it's not a sign of head trauma.

“How does you ankle feel?” he asks, automatically reaching out to palpate it for injuries. “Any sharp pain when you wiggle your toes?”

The boy scowls at him, dark brows pulling together. “What the fuck’s it got to do with you?”

At his angry tone, the little ring of people that has formed around them shrinks back, obviously fearing trouble, but John is unruffled. People in pain are often aggressive and the boy’s reaction is nothing he hasn’t had to deal with hundreds of times before. “I’m a doctor,” he says quietly.

The boy’s top lip curls into a suspicious sneer. “Says you. Ain’t got no proof though, have you? For all I know, you’re just another perv trying to feel me up.”

“Actually-” John reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out his hospital ID. “- I have. Proof. See?”

The kid squints at it. “Doctor John H Watson,” he reads slowly, sounding each syllable carefully. “Accident and Emergency. Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Trust.”

“That’s me,” John confirms with a smile. “Now, if you’ll let me, I’d like to take a closer look at that ankle.”

But instead of agreeing, the boy springs to his feet, grinning. “No need, mate! I’m fine. Thanks anyway, though.” And with a small wave of salute, he runs off down the pavement, grubby training shoes splashing through the puddles.

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

_Text: Dr W working at St Thomas’. A &E Department. B_

_Text: Excellent. Payment on way. Extra for a photograph. SH_

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Saturday, March 23rd_ **

 

 

The cherry trees in Peckham Rye Park are in full bloom, their boughs heavy with blossom as pink and fluffy as candy-floss between the vivid green of the new grass below them and the clear, blue sky overhead.

In Afghanistan, battling to save lives in field hospital tents pitched on barren dust and sand, John never allowed himself to think about cherry trees, or grass, or blossom. He doesn’t allow himself to them about them now either: beauty is short-lived and fragile, no sooner glimpsed than swept away by the wind. It won’t be long before those cherry boughs are stripped bare, so he marches on, head down, arms swinging. If he doesn’t dawdle, he might just make it to Beckenham Junction in time for the 9.23 train. He should have risen earlier and walked the whole way to work: it’s a beautiful, spring day - the kind of day which, in his youth, would have set his belly fluttering with expectation - and god knows, he needs the exercise. It's just that he didn’t sleep well last night.

He never sleeps well now. 

It’s better not to think about the reason why. It’s been a long, hard year, but he’s finally starting to put it all behind him, and slowly, things are improving. He’s found somewhere to live - a flat he can actually afford - and a job; a permanent, regular, worthwhile job. His life has structure and order, and if sometimes he finds himself limping again, he puts it down to working too hard, or being tired, or even just to getting old. He turned forty two weeks ago, after all. Bodies age. There's only way to avoid the onward march of time and that's-

A voice sounds in his head. It belongs to Lieutenant Colonel Davenport and he's reading the Ode of Remembrance: _They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old. Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we shall remember them._ Almost at once, a second voice takes over: Mr Brock, Head of English at Chelmsford Grammar, reading from _Antony and Cleopatra_ : _Age cannot wither her, nor custom make stale her infinite variety. Other women cloy the appetites they feed, but she makes hungry where most she satisfies._

A third voice, John’s own, takes over, condensing it all down to a single word: _Sherlock_. Swallowing hard, John walks faster. He’s got a train to catch, a job to do. A life to lead. 

However impossible that may still seem.

 

 

Late mornings are usually pretty quiet in A&E, and today is no exception, John notices, as he pulls on his white coat and ensures his name badge is the right way around. He looks around the waiting room, taking in the handful of patients on the hard plastic chairs - and is surprised to see a familiar face: the tube driver he treated for shock last night. The man is slumped on his seat, ashen-faced and staring blankly into space. John buys a sweet, white coffee from the vending machine and takes it over.

“Here,” he says, offering the polystyrene cup.

The man jerks in surprise. “What?”

“You’ve been here all night,” John explains. “You must be exhausted.”

Recognition flickers in the man’s bloodshot eyes. “Last night … you were the doctor.”

“Yes. The doctor who gave you tablets to help you sleep and told you to go home and rest.”

“Couldn’t,” the man says simply, accepting the coffee.

John knows how he feels. “Did no-one tell you he died?” he asks gently.

“They didn’t bloody need to!” the man spits, in his agitation slamming the cup down on an adjacent chair. Steaming coffee leaps up in a heavy arc, and splashes down onto the floor, the seat and the back of his hand. The skin turns red but he doesn’t seem to notice. “I _saw_ it, remember?”

John closes his eyes for a second, trying not to remember.

“I hate bloody jumpers,” the man goes on, his voice trembling with rage. “Selfish bastards. I hope he rots in hell.”

“You don’t mean that,” John says quietly. “Not really.”

“Don’t tell me what I mean!” The man is shouting now, attracting attention, and some of the other patients are looking at him in alarm. “You’ve got no idea what it’s like, having to watch someone die, when there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”

Sherlock, falling, fills John’s mind - the sickening seconds, seconds which felt like hours, when all John could do was watch. And now he’s picturing Sherlock’s lifeless body, painfully soft and human on the unforgiving paving slabs, his beautiful head in that alarmingly dark pool of blood. It was all so wrong. Made no sense.

“I was in Afghanistan,” John replies because, god help him, the multiple deaths he witnessed there are so much easier to think about. “With the army.”

A look of respect comes over the man’s face, and sits up straighter, nodding. “Right. Sorry, mate. You _do_ know. Sorry.”

“Go home,” John says. “Take the drugs and try to get some sleep.”

The driver raises a sceptical eyebrow. “And it’ll seem better in the morning?” 

John smiles, sadly. “It takes a bit longer than that. In my experience.”

“But eventually,” the driver nods, as though that’s what John just said.

John nods back, because if he weren’t clinging to that hope, he’d be a jumper too.

 

 

The rest of the morning crawls by. There’s a little kid who’s managed to stuff a stone up one nostril, and a carpenter whose cornea has been badly scraped by a stray shaving of wood, but apart from them, it’s all very routine: twisted ankles, minor burns, dog bites, and the odd broken bone. However, just after noon, the pace begins to pick up. Millwall are playing at home and apparently there was a pub brawl. Much as John hates to see people suffering or in pain - even drunken football hooligans who curse his every attempt at helping them, when they’re not busy throwing up or farting - he’s much happier when he’s busy. Busy means feeling useful. It means doing his very best for the patient in front of him in as short a time as possible. It means not thinking about anything else, not thinking about Sherlock. Mostly. John’s heart clenches. He had him for such a short time that sometimes he wishes he’d never had him at all. The emptiness he’s left behind-

“Wassup with you?” the overweight, inebriated twenty-something on the exam table suddenly demands, though not with any sympathy. He’s staring at John, nose wrinkled, as if disgusted and, to John’s horror, he realizes he has tears in his eyes.

“Antiseptic fumes,” he explains hastily, scrubbing them away. “Allergic.” Anyone with half a brain would realize it’s a lie - a doctor? allergic to antiseptics? - but John seriously doubts his patient has even that: it’s obvious he’s a complete idiot. 

Unfortunately, even idiots are occasionally blessed with a sort of low, animal cunning, and the yob narrows his eyes, scrutinizing John’s face closely. “You’re _him_ ,” he says at last. “The other one.”

 _Oh god._ Seeking refuge in rifling through a drawer for some gauze, John clears his throat. “Other one?”

“The side-kick. Robin. Hat-man and Robin,” his patient clarifies, and now there’s laughter in his voice - the same kind of vicious, insinuating laughter that followed John everywhere he went in the first few months after Sherlock’s suicide.

“I don’t know what-”

“Fucking queers, both of you. I hate queers. And _’im_ , he was some kind of perv too, wasn’t he? Kidnapping them kids.”

John clenches his fists, his jaw, against the upsurge of rage the accusation causes. “He _rescued_ them,” he says, concentrating hard on the edges of the words as if they have the power to stop him breaking apart.

The yob cackles triumphantly. “Yeah, to make himself look good but it was all fake, wa’n’ it? _He_ was a fake!”

Inevitably, John’s self-control snaps, all recollection of the Hippocratic Oath blown away like dust on the wind, and he grabs his patient by the throat. “He was worth a hundred of you, you little piece of shit,” he snarls, right into his face.

A look of fear flickers momentarily in the yob’s eyes, but he’s young and drunk and full of bravado. He snorts. “If he was so great, then why’d’e top himself, eh?”

The question is like a kick to the gut. It’s one John has been asking himself ever since it happened. He knew - _knows_ \- Sherlock was for real. It wasn’t shame that made him jump; it was something else. And try as he might to find a more bearable explanation, the only one John can come up with is that Sherlock did it for him, to protect him in some way. It’s the only explanation of _all_ of the facts. _Greater love hath no man …_ Sherlock might never have said the words, but the feeling was there, John knows it was, and the knowing, and the having to live without it, breaks his heart a little more every day.

“Got no answer to that, have ya?” the yob taunts with a harsh laugh. “He was a fake! A pathetic, lying, paedo fake!”

Twelve months. John has had to suffer crap like this for twelve months. Well, no more. The sadness that moments ago was threatening to drown him evaporates, burnt away by sheer fury, and he shoves his patient hard, until his back almost hits the exam table, then yanks him back up again. “I was a soldier,” he tells him, enjoying the look of alarm on the man’s face. “I killed people. So, if I were you, I’d think very carefully before saying anything else.”

The patient’s swaggering bravado instantly shrivels. He even seems to sober up a bit as he raises both hands in surrender. “All right, mate. Sorry. I was only sayin’ what the papers-”

“The papers,” John returns, icily, “are wrong.”

“Yeah, yeah.” The man nods in hurried agreement. “Probably are. Lying bastards." He swallows. "Listen, mate - are you, uh, gonna let me go now?”

For a moment, John thinks he’s asking whether he needs to be kept in for observation, but then he sees his own hand, still twisting the neck of his patient’s football shirt tight around his throat, the knuckles turning white from the fierceness of his grip. He swallows, and lets his hand drop away. “I’ll just put a dressing on,” he says, forcing himself to sound calmer than he feels. The papers have been full of shit ever since Sherlock … ever since he died, and most people seem to believe it. Struggling to reach Sherlock’s broken body outside of Bart’s, at the funeral, in the cemetery afterwards, John had though he couldn't possibly feel any lonelier. The tabloids - and even some of the broadsheets - subsequently proved him wrong. Sometimes it seems he’s the only person in the world who doesn’t think Sherlock was a fraud.

He places a sterile dressing over the plastic stitches he’s used to repair the gash on his patient’s cheek and secures it in place with adhesive tape. He’s just about to advise keeping it on for twenty-four hours, and to ensure that the wound is kept clean and dry, when the consulting room door is flung open and two uniformed policeman burst in, half-carrying, half-dragging a man between them. The man’s head is slumped forward, lolling worryingly against his chest, and his feet aren’t moving. There’s a cut on the top of his head, oozing blood into his short, grey hair, but it’s not deep enough to account for the amount of blood that’s dripping in fat red blobs onto the lino.

“Knife wound, lower abdomen,” the taller of the two policemen says. “Twenty minutes ago. He’s lost a lot of blood.”

As the injured man is brought forward, John is vaguely aware of his previous patient melting silently away but the focus of his attention is elsewhere now. This is serious. He yanks out another couple of yards of protective paper to cover the exam table and gestures to the policemen to help the wounded man onto it. When John sees the man’s face, his heart stops. He hasn’t seen him for so long.

“Lestrade!”

Lestrade groans at the sound of his name, and tries to open his eyes, but he’s too weak, and slips quickly back into unconsciousness. John peels off his gloves. Snaps on a new pair. Checks Lestrade’s airway. Presses two fingertips to his carotid artery. The pulse beneath them is frantic - a hundred and thirty beats per minutes. If John hadn’t already known the injury was serious, he does now. “Three bags of O neg and a transfusion line,” he barks at the nurse who appears in the doorway. She nods, and rushes away.

Grabbing a pair scissors from his drawer, John cuts away the front of Lestrade’s trousers. They’re soaked with blood - his underpants too - and John cuts them off as well, using a sterile wipe to clean the skin underneath so that he can see what’s happening.

The uniformed officers were right: there’s a single, deep stab wound. A significant amount of blood is pouring from it, but it’s pouring, not pumping. The loss - thank god - is from a vein, not an artery. John allows himself a small moment of relief, but only a small one. There’s no telling yet how much internal damage has been done. Lestrade’s bowel may have been nicked, his bladder torn.

A rattle of wheels announces the return of the nurse with a trolley bearing blood, a transfusion line and saline. Working quickly, John finds a suitable vein in Lestrade’s thigh and inserts a catheter, whilst the nurse hooks a bag of O Neg to the stand at the head of the exam table. She opens the valve, lets the blood trickle down, tapping out air-bubbles as it goes, then fixes the line into the catheter. Meanwhile, John sounds Lestrade’s heart and lungs, and palpates his belly for obvious signs of any other injury.

“BP’s eighty-five over sixty,” the nurse announces.

“Prep him for peritoneal lavage,”John tells her, “and let’s get a CT scan.”

“Is he going to be all right?” an unfamiliar female voice asks.

“It’s too early to say,” John replies, not looking up. “We’ll do what we can.”

“Yes,” the voice murmurs. “Thank you, doctor. Thank you.”

If she says anything else, John doesn’t hear it. He’s too busy helping the nurse wheel Lestrade away.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Sherlock regards the steak the waiter has set before him with a mix of hunger and revulsion. The portion is too large and the meat too bloody (even John doesn’t like beef _this_ rare). Then again, he hasn't eaten in days, and is beginning to feel rather light-headed and unstable, so he pins the grisly thing to the plate with his fork and cuts off the thinnest of slivers, shuddering slightly as he raises the morsel to his lips.

It's better than he expected - surprisingly so - and, as he starts chewing, he sets about analyzing why; cataloguing the tastes (salt, iron, blood) and the textures (lean, tender flesh that yields easily to biting), only for the two to conspire to bring back a flood of memories, and all of a sudden, he’s somewhere else entirely - the living room in 221B, with John naked and stretched out beneath him, his body hard and eager, echoing and amplifying every movement Sherlock makes, every thrust and grind, begging for more. (No, not begging - _demanding_ more.) (John has turned provocation into an art form.) Sherlock's only human, and there's only so much goading he can take. He sinks his teeth into the flesh at John’s collarbone and bites - sharply enough to break the thin skin. John gasps and stiffens.

Sherlock looks him in the eye: what he does next will depend on what he sees there. When they’re together like this, he only ever does what John wants; if he’s tender and gentle, it's because John needs him to be; but if he’s rough or domineering, it's because that’s what John is asking for - not with words, maybe (John is still absurdly reluctant to verbalize some things) but with a look, or a change in his breathing, or in the beat of his pulse.

Right now, John is looking back up at him, his pupils huge and black (desire). His mouth is open, slack; his breathing: rapid. (Excitement.) (And - there! - there’s that tell-tale upward press of his pelvis.) (Rough - tonight, he wants rough.) (He rarely wants tenderness.) (It’s almost as if it scares him.) Sherlock pins his wrists to the cushions above his head and bites him again, sucking fiercely at the developing bruise …

“Encore du vin, monsieur?” a bright, female voice asks, hauling Sherlock unceremoniously back to the present.

Resentment boils up in him and he glares at her - a young and perky waitress in starched black and white, with a bottle poised over his empty glass. “Non! Foutez-moi la paix!”

With typical Gallic indifference, the woman shrugs and moves on to the next table. (Sometimes you have to admire the French.) (And even feel _proud_ to share some of the same blood.)

Still trembling slightly from the rude intrusion into his thoughts (and yes, from the thoughts themselves as well), Sherlock takes out his phone and stabs in another angry message to Mycroft.

_Text: How much longer, Mycroft? I need to come home. SH_

Mycroft makes him wait for an answer (he’s probably schmoozing foreign diplomats or arranging a nice little discreet coup somewhere); it's not until Sherlock is crossing the mosaic-tiled courtyard in front of his hotel that his phone buzzes in reply.

_Text: You’ve rather shown your hand re J. They know you’d die for him. Imagine what they might make you do to keep them from hurting him. Stay. Where. You. Are. MH_

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

The surgery goes well, the lacerations to Lestrade’s iliac vein and lower abdomen neatly repaired with no complications. His blood pressure rises, and his pulse returns to normal. As he’s wheeled away to the recovery ward, John peels off his nitrile gloves and removes his mask, wiping sweat from his brow. Operating on someone you know is always hard, and he would have happily stepped aside if any of his colleagues had been available, but they were all up to their ears with the victims of that pile-up on Westminster Bridge. Although, if he's honest, John knows none of them would have done a better job of it: he isn’t just a good doctor; he’s _very_ good. 

It’s the one thing he’s still sure of.

According to the operating room clock, it’s six thirty-three. He should have gone off-duty two hours ago. No wonder he feels tired. And hungry. He strips out of his scrubs and tosses them into the bin, splashes cold water onto his face and the back of his neck at the sink, then makes a bee-line for the canteen. They close at seven on Saturdays; if he hurries, he might have time for a cup of tea and a sandwich.

The canteen is almost completely empty, its Formica-topped tables littered with empty crisps bags and biscuit wrappers, and used crockery waiting to be cleared away. The only people still around are a couple of elderly WRVS volunteers preparing to cash up the till, and a woman with dark blond hair, sitting by herself, nursing a half-drunk mug of coffee.

John makes his way to the counter, snatches up the only remaining sandwich - a dried-out, white bread, cheese and pickle number - and, with an apologetic smile at the volunteers, orders tea. The smaller of the two women sighs and pours him a mugful from a vast, catering teapot. 

“Milk and sugar on the tables,” she tells him, “and we shut at seven.”

John nods. “Yes. Thank you.” The woman doesn’t know he works here too. Though why should she? Even so, her lack of recognition makes what’s already been a rather depressing day drearier still, and he heads rather glumly for one of the cleaner tables.

“Doctor?” he hears someone ask.

He turns to find the blond woman looking up at him hopefully. He forces a smile. “Yes. Can I …?”

“You treated the guv, didn’t you?” she asks. “Inspector Lestrade, I mean.”

“Ye-es?”

“I know you’ve got your rules on confidentiality,” the woman says, “but can I ask how he is? I’m Sergeant Morstan, by the way. Metropolitan Police, CID.” She’s nice-looking - handsome, rather than pretty - with large blue eyes, full, pink lips, and a nice smile.

“He’s fine,” John tells her. “Well, as fine as it’s possible to be after you’ve been stabbed.”

The woman - Sergeant Morstan - lets out a long breath. “Thank goodness. I’d never have forgiven myself … It was a stupid mistake …” She shakes her head. 

“He’s _fine_ ,” John says again, more emphatically. “He’s probably still groggy from the anaesthetic but if you wanted-”

Morstan shakes her head again. “No. Not my place. I’ll come and see him tomorrow. Molly’s with him. I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

 _Molly_. John feels his heart jump at her name. So, she’s still with Lestrade? John didn’t know. She’s someone else he’s been avoiding, ever since … Sherlock would be pleased, though, John thinks, as a memory comes rushing back to him.

_”Molly and Lestrade? You’re joking!”_

_“On the contrary. I’m perfectly serious, John.”_

_“Are you _sure_?”_

_Sherlock raised an eyebrow and did The Face._

_“Yeah, all right, you’re sure,” John conceded. “But how? When?”_

_Sherlock’s Smug Face became smugger still. “I may have given Lestrade a little push in the right direction.”_

_John felt his jaw drop. “You?”_

_Sherlock pulled him closer. “Everyone likes a happy ending, John. I’m no exception.”_

_He looked so pleased with himself, half like a magician after a successful magic trick and half like a kid waiting for praise, that a warm wave of fondness washed over John. “You’re wrong about that, you know,” he smiled, raising a hand to cup the side of Sherlock’s face. “You are. Exceptional.”_

_Sherlock leant in and kissed him lightly. “Tell me that again later,” he murmured against John’s lips, hands already moving to John’s waist to unbuckle his belt. “Afterwards.”_

And he was, John remembers - absolutely bloody phenomenal. As the details of that night start replaying in his head, he feels his cock twitch into life, but the pleasure’s short-lived because reality comes crashing back in all too quickly. Sherlock is gone. Dead. And no-one can ever replace him, John knows. Sherlock has ruined him for life.

“Are you, uh, all right?”

John blinks and Sergeant Morstan’s concerned face comes into focus again. He nods, smiles weakly. “It’s been a long day,” he explains.

Not to mention the longest, most unbearable year.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Friday, April 5th_ **

 

 

The sun is still shining when John leaves work at six, and the sky behind the looming East Wing tower still a bright, gold-tinged blue. John is so taken with gazing up at it that he very nearly collides with someone walking towards him, only becoming aware of the approaching figure at the very last minute.

His first impression is of a soft, hesitant presence; then he blinks and sees Molly Hooper - _Molly Hooper!_ \- smiling her I-Know-I’m-An-Idiot-But smile at him. The way she always used to smile at Sherlock - hopeful, yet hopeless. It always broke John’s heart.

“Hey,” she says, shrugging her shoulders, as if denying she ever even wanted a warm hello because she knows it’s not coming. She even goes so far as to point at herself and say “Molly” as though she doesn't expect John to recognize her.

He hugs her. “Molly! _Hello_! You look -” He holds her at arms length, really looking. Her eyes are shining, her hair glossy, and she’s ever-so-slightly more rounded. Almost curvy. “- _great_.”

Her eyes dart away, and she dips her head to one side, embarrassed, but she’s smiling too - properly now. “Thanks. I, uh, wanted to thank you. For taking care of Greg.” Her cheeks flush pink at the mention of his name, and she looks away again. “What you did … it was brilliant.”

“Any competent surgeon would have done the same,” John insists. Compliments from Molly always sting. She makes him feel guilty, greedy - without ever once meaning to: she loved Sherlock too. “How’s he doing?”

“He’s fine,” Molly nods. “Fine.” And suddenly her face grows serious and she bites her bottom lip. “What about you? How ... have you been?”

John can’t bear the sympathy in her eyes. He stands taller and plasters on a smile. “Oh, you know - getting there. Found a new flat - south of the river, but it’s good. Nice neighbours. Decent bus service. And there’s the job, of course. That’s … good, too.”

“Come out with us one night,” Molly blurts. “With me and Greg, I mean. For a drink. Or a meal. Or anything, really.” She fiddles nervously with her hair, unhooking a perfectly tidy strand of hair from where it's pulled back into a ponytail, only to instantly start trying to tuck it back in again. “If you like.” 

John stuffs his hands into his pockets and looks at his feet. “I don’t know. It’s kind of you but-”

“You look sad,” Molly interrupts. “You never used to look sad.” She swallows, takes a breath. “You’re still on your own, aren’t you?”

John almost laughs. Of course he is. As if anyone else could take Sherlock’s place. Ever.

“Sorry!” Molly gasps, and she lays a hand on John’s arm, squeezing it briefly. “That was a stupid thing to say. Of course you are … Sorry. Look, come out with us on Sunday. There’s a pub quiz at the Warwick. You’d like it there. It’s quiet, cosy.”

John blinks at her. The difference between who people think he is, and who he _actually_ is, never ceases to amaze him. He’s never wanted quiet or cosy. He joined the army, for god’s sake - and when, at last, he fell in love it was with Sherlock, of all people. Where was the quiet or cosy in either of those? And then he remembers how long it took even Sherlock to work him out. Sometimes he forgets how very good he is at dissembling.

“All right,” he nods, because Molly looks terribly anxious to put things right again. “I’ll think about it.”

“Eight o’clock sharp,” she says, then hesitates for a split second before darting in to plant a quick peck on the cheek. “See you there. Don’t be late!”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

_Text: Here you go. Photo attached. B_

Sherlock’s heart starts to race as soon as he reads the message, and he can’t get the attachment open quickly enough. The photo loads slowly, flickering and jumping as he tries to zoom in on the slight figure standing outside what appears to be the entrance to St Thomas’ A&E.

(Oh god, it’s him. At last. John.) 

Sherlock swallows. Looks away. Takes two deep breaths, then looks back, tracing the outline of John’s body with a forefinger. (His hips are narrower than they used to be - those brown cords are hanging off him. He looks thinner, smaller …) A rush of selfish relief goes through Sherlock. (John isn’t eating properly.) (No-one is feeding him up and he’s lost the healthy appetite that normally would have prompted him to cook for himself.) (He’s miserable.) Using his thumb and forefinger to expand the image, Sherlock homes in on the face (John’s beautifully expressive face.) He wishes the image were clearer because he wants to see, _really_ see, how much John is missing him. But he can’t. He calls up Billy’s number and types in a new message.

_Text: Payment on its way. Double for something clearer. Hurry! SH_

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Sunday, April 7th_ **

 

 

Traffic on Vauxhall Bridge is heavy, and the 185’s resultant jerky progress across it mirrors perfectly how John is feeling: uncomfortable, hesitant but obliged to go on. Out towards Battersea, the sun has almost set behind the thin layer of cloud that's been obscuring it all day and in the grey evening light, the Thames looks oily and sinuous - almost dangerous. John hasn’t crossed it in nearly a year: it’s not just the people from his life with Sherlock’s that he’s been hiding from; it’s the places too. Thank god the Warwick is a good three miles from Baker Street, and further still from Barts. John doesn’t think he could handle seeing either, although he couldn’t say for sure which would be worse - the horrific memories, or the deliriously happy ones.

The bus ploughs on, through Bessborough Gardens and into Pimlico. The occasional glimpse of a half-stuccoed house-front makes John’s throat tighten painfully, but he forces himself to breathe through it and focus on the road ahead instead: for the most part Vauxhall Bridge Road is reassuringly modern and commercial, with cheap plastic shop signs in garish colours - a world away from the gaunt elegance of Baker Street.

It’s not a long walk from the bus stop to the Warwick. A few hardy souls are sitting at the pavement tables outside, sucking on cigarettes. Doctorly disapproval rises unbidden in John, but he squashes it down again: he understands addiction a lot better now and knows first-hand that withdrawal’s a bitch. Tonight will be good for him; it might even put him on the path to recovery - or, at least, that’s what he tells himself as he pushes Warwick’s doors open and steps inside.

The bar is packed, and John's first thought is that it’s too much, and that he should leave, but then he spots Molly, standing up and waving him over to a table in the corner by the fireplace, and it’s too late. Leaving now would look like cowardice - desertion - so he nods, points at the bar and goes to buy himself a drink.

Getting his pint from the bar to the table unspilt looks like it might be a tricky job, so John takes a good swig of it first. Less chance of inadvertently sloshing it over someone else that way, and downing a few mouthfuls has the added advantage of making him feel a bit more relaxed, so that he’s able to smile almost normally at Molly and Greg. And at the woman sitting with them. She seems familiar and, as he takes the vacant seat beside her, John feels himself frowning, trying to remember where he knows her from. Somewhere at the back of his head, he hears Sherlock sigh and chide, ‘As ever, John, you see but you do not _observe_ ’, but all of a sudden, it comes to him: she’s Sergeant Morstan, from the hospital.

“John!” Greg is on his feet, leaning over the table to clasp John’s hand tightly. “I need to buy _you_ a pint!”

“Maybe later,” John agrees, glad to be on safe, work territory. “Everything coming along all right? With the repairs? Any problems?”

“None at all. “ Greg relinquishes John’s hand to pat his belly contentedly. “My GP reckons, if I stick to desk work for a bit, I can go back to work next week. Talking of which, you remember Mary, right?” He indicates Sergeant Morstan with a wave of his hand. “My new sergeant.”

John nods again, and smiles some more. “Pleased to meet you. Again. Have you, uh, been working with Greg long?”

“Almost a year,” Morstan - _Mary_ \- replies, adding with an attention to detail which John can’t help thinking Sherlock would approve of, “well, just under eleven months, actually. I got transferred last June.”

“Donovan got a promotion,”Greg says, answering through gritted teeth the question that was only just taking shape in John's mind. Sherlock always did say Lestrade was sharper than everyone else at the Met. “On the fast track to the top now.”

John knows why; they all know why. He takes a long sip from his bitter.

“Trouble is,” Greg goes on, the hint of a wicked smile making his eyes twinkle, “I’m still lumbered with Anderson. Who’s not getting any these days - the wife left him, did you know? - which means he’s worse than ever. Honestly, it’s just as well Sh-” 

Molly cuts him short by brandishing a sheet of A4 paper in his face. “Come on,” she says briskly. “We need to think up a team name.”

After a bit of good-natured arguing, they finally settle on ‘The Deadbeats’ and Greg goes to get another round in. He’s scarcely back at the table when a bizarre looking bloke in a striped blazer, sporting a dark moustache with waxed tips, announces the start of the quiz.

So far, so not too terrible, John thinks with relief, and the General Knowledge round begins.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Sherlock will concede that if one _has_ be exiled from one’s native land - and, more importantly, from one’s lover’s bed (although, strictly speaking, that should be from one’s _own_ bed and the eager lover who was so easily cajoled, ordered or dragged into it) (when he wasn't busy leaping into it of his own accord with an expectant grin, that is), then there are probably worse places in the world to be holed up than the Baudon de Mauny. His capacious, en suite bath is full of hot, rose-scented water (the toiletries come with the room and being clean is one of the precious few pleasures left at the moment) and there’s a jacuzzi setting for those so inclined. Sherlock slips deeper into it and begins soaping himself.

Carefully. 

He can’t avoid erections altogether (if only) (they happen with all too annoying frequency), but he _can_ avoid deliberately giving himself one. At first, when the memories of John were fresh and vivid, masturbation helped ease his hideous sense of bereavement, but after a few months, it only served to make him feel lonelier still. Rinsing the soap from his throat and chest, Sherlock wonders if John still wanks to thoughts of him. He hopes so. Someone like John …. Well, his needs run deeper still, and if he’s not pleasuring himself then-

(No.) (Don’t think that way.) (He loves you, you idiot. Look at the evidence!) (He'll wait - and when your bastard brother eventually lets you go home, he’ll be yours again. He was always was and always will be.)

Sherlock smiles to himself and scrubs at his toes, imagining himself knocking at John’s door, or surprising him on the street outside the hospital. He can just picture the look of amazement on John's face, the disbelieving, overjoyed embrace that will follow, and the hours and hours they’ll spend having sex to make up for lost time.

(Obviously John will be a bit resentful to start with - angry, even - at not having been in on the plan from the start. There'll probably be a bit of shouting, and maybe even a punch.) (Note to self: John has a formidable right hook, and though he may love you enough to avoid your nose and teeth, it doesn’t mean the blow will be any less painful. Be ready for it.) (But in the end, he’ll come round. He never has been able to resist a firm hand, after all.) (Or a demanding kiss.) (Or a growled instruction to strip off.)

Content that he has foreseen every possible reaction John might have to his reappearance, Sherlock sinks beneath the water to rinse the shampoo (ziao jao fruit and Indian cress, apparently) from his hair, then steps out of the bath and dries himself off with the most ridiculously fluffy, white towel he has ever seen, feeling more positive than he has in a very long time.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Pen poised over their quiz sheet, John is now quietly confident they'll win the quiz night's big cash prize. They didn’t make a brilliant job of the pop music round, it’s true - they were pretty much stumped when it came to anything after 2006 - but they scored full points on the General Knowledge round, and nine out of a possible ten on the Geography Round. Now it’s Famous Mysteries and, with two detectives, one assistant pathologist and a doctor-stroke-soldier on the team, John reckons they stand a good chance of scoring another ten.

“Question one,” the quiz master announces. “We all know the name of Jack the Ripper, but in which year did he carry out his gruesome murders?”

A low rumble of muttering begins as the Deadbeats’ rivals try to work out the answer. Greg rolls his eyes and snorts, “Too easy!” John’s about to offer him the pen, when Mary seizes it and prints ‘1888’ in a bold, decisive hand.

“Question two: what was the real name of the American murder victim known as the Black Dahlia?”

A protesting groan goes up around the room, but Mary’s got this one too: ‘Elizabeth Short’. John raises a querying eyebrow but she nods emphatically. 

“I’m impressed,” he tells her with an admiring smile.

She lifts her chin, smiling back. “So you should be.” Her voice is low, sultry - and it suddenly hits John that he’s been set up, that this is a blind date, that Molly and Greg expect him to _go out with_ this woman. A flutter of panic rises in his throat. Mary’s nice. Good-looking, clever and pleasant - probably sober and solvent too - but she’s not-

“Question three: give the location of the last reported sighting of Lord Lucan.”

Concentrating on the quiz is the only answer, John decides, coming up with a plan of action as swiftly as if he were back on the battlefield: stick to the questions, avoid any look or comment that could possibly be interpreted as flirting, and claim the last bus home leaves at ten. “South of France?” he mouths pointedly at Greg - because their foursome has to remain a _group_ , not two nice, cosy couples.

“Who the hell is Lord Lucan?” a bloke at the next table demands. He’s young - mid-twenties.

“That posh bloke,” one of his friends supplies in a loud whisper. “You know - the one who murdered his kids’ nanny and tried to kill his wife.”

“Oh yeah. Him. Thought he topped himself straight afterwards?”

“That’s what the establishment _wanted_ us to think,” the friend hisses. “But he didn’t. He escaped to South America, started a new life. It was all in the papers for years. My old man told me about it - how the royal family, and the government, and the police all agreed to let him scarper. Part of the old boys’ network, see? One rule for them, and another for the rest of us."

Greg sighs and rolls his eyes. “Conspiracy theorists,” he tuts, shaking his head. “Lucan committed suicide. He knew we’d get him eventually - and he was old school. Couldn’t face the court case or the humiliation, so he killed himself. End of.”

John’s blood runs cold. “Suicide isn’t always a matter of guilt,” he hears himself say.

“Yeah, and sometimes it _is_.” Greg takes a drink from his glass and leans back in his chair, so sure of himself and his reasoning that John’s blood runs colder still. “There was a warrant out for his arrest and the story was all over the media - all manner of dirt about the state of his marriage, the lies he’d told, the way he’d duped his friends into helping him, and that's before the murder, as well as after. Until then, everyone thought he was ‘respectable’ so when it all came out, he couldn’t bear the shame. Classic, really.”

Molly’s eyes have gone wide with alarm and they dart rapidly between Greg and John. “I’ll just put ‘South of France’ as our answer then, shall I?” she asks, with a nervous smile, in what John can see is a desperate attempt to steer them away from this dangerous topic, but he’s angry now and he narrows his eyes at Greg, fighting a powerful urge to chin him just like he chinned his Chief Superintendent.

“Is that what you think about Sherlock?” he demands coldly. “That he killed himself because he couldn’t face the shame?”

Greg has the good grace to looked shocked, as if Sherlock couldn’t have been further from his mind. “What? I wasn’t-”

“So you _don’t_ think that?” John throws down the question like a gauntlet, a year’s worth of suppressed rage at all the lies and snickering finally bubbling up to the surface.

Greg’s mouth opens and closes, but nothing comes out, and his face flushes slightly. It could be the effect of the alcohol he’s consumed, or the warmth of the room, but neither would account for the distinctly guilty look in his eyes.

“ _Jesus_ ,” John growls. “You do. You believe it. You actually bloody _believe_ it.” He’s shaking now, but he doesn’t care. It almost feels good to defend Sherlock in public for a change, instead of going over and over it all alone in his head, trying to make sense of the incomprehensible.

Lestrade scratches the back of his neck. “Well, I _didn’t_. Not to start with … but then he went and offed himself, didn’t he? Why would he have done a thing like that if he hadn’t been faking all along?”

John stands, his chair making an angry scraping noise as he pushes it back. “I can’t hear this. I’m going. Because if I stay - god help me, Lestrade - I’m going to end up punching you.”

“Question four!” Molly cries, her voice high and tight. “He just asked question four! Where was the Marie Celeste found floating without her crew?”

John ignores her. He has to get out, and quickly. The walk across the bar, weaving in and out of tables, seems interminable but, at long bloody last, he reaches the door. After the heat of the pub, the chill evening air out on the street makes him shiver but at least it gives him a good excuse for the way he’s trembling. He leans against a wall, pinching the bridge of his nose between a thumb and forefinger, trying to control his breathing and calm himself down. There’s cigarette smoke on the air, from the gaggle of tobacco addicts still sitting at the outside tables, and normally he'd move away from the worst of it, but right now he needs a minute, just a minute, to collect himself.

“John?” a soft voice enquires.

He looks up. It’s Mary. She’s in right front of him, but keeping her distance, doing her best not to intrude.

“Are you all right?” she asks. “You look-”

“I’m fine.” John raises both hands in a blocking gesture. He doesn’t want her any nearer. He doesn’t want her here _at all_. “ _Fine_ \- because unlike your boss, I _know_ Sherlock was for real.”

“Yes,” Mary says quietly. “I think you’re right.”

At first, John thinks he must have misheard. “Sorry? What did you say?”

“I said I think you’re right. About your friend.”

“Do you?” John gives a bitter laugh. God, does she really think this will work? That her being understanding will lure him back inside? “Why?”

Mary frowns, hesitates. “Because I’ve read the official report,” she says at last. “The Guv’s been under a lot of pressure ever since it happened. The Chief blamed him for a lot of it. Suspended him for a month, then put him on two years’ probation. It felt like my duty to read it - as a way of supporting my commanding officer.”

“Official report!” John gives an impatient huff. “Yeah, I can just imagine it. Claimed he was ‘a bit of a weirdo’, did it? A ‘vigilante type’? More bollocks like that?”

To John’s amazement, Mary smiles. True, her smile is a wry one, but it’s still a smile. “It did, actually. Well, words to that effect.” She pauses, then takes a step closer, lowering her voice. “You know I shouldn’t be telling you any of this, don’t you? But you knew him. I think you might be able to help.”

“Help?” John asks. Help what? What _the hell_ is she talking about?

Mary looks left, then right, and comes closer still before answering. “There are a lot of missing pages.”

“Pages?” John echoes. Because apparently, he’s lost the ability to do anything more taxing than repeat the last thing Mary says.

“The post-mortem report,” Mary tells him. “Next of kin interview. Psychiatric report. They’re all missing.”

John is confused. “What are you saying?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. But it’s not right.”

“Could someone have borrowed the papers?”

“There would have been a note. Someone would have had to sign for them.”

A thought pops into John’s head. A name. “Mycroft wouldn’t have had to sign for them.”

Mary blinks at him. “You think _Mycroft Holmes_ has them?”

John shrugs. “Maybe. I don't know. You could always ask him.”

Mary shakes her head, backing away. “Mycroft Holmes? No, I really couldn’t. I’m only a Detective Sergeant. People like Mycroft Holmes don’t speak to the likes of me.”

John sets his jaw, remembering his last meeting with Mycroft, that night in the Diogenes Club, and suddenly he’s interested. “Maybe not, but he’ll talk to _me_ ,” he says. “He owes me. I could manage Thurs-”

A brilliant flash of light cuts him off. For a split-second, the adrenalin still rushing around his system tells him it’s an incoming flare; then he remembers he’s in London, not Helmand. 

“What the hell?” he mutters, rubbing his dazzled eyes.

“Nothing,” Mary insists. “Just a kid on a skateboard, taking photos. Over there, see?”

John follows the direction of her pointing finger to where a scrawny teenager, camera in hand, is skating along the pavement, snapping his camera randomly at passers-by and shop windows. John lets out a sigh of relief and Mary laughs. “Yeah, I thought they were onto me for a moment there. Okay, John. Thanks. I’ll stop by at the hospital early next week and we can arrange a day to try to speak to Mr Holmes. But _you_ have to talk to him. I don’t think I could.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” John says, thinking grimly of all the thoughts he has yet to share with Mycroft on the subject of his complete and utter betrayal of his brother, "it’ll be my pleasure.”

 

* * * * * * * * 

 

_**Monday, April 8th** _

 

 

By the time Sherlock awakes, some of the fierce light of another sunny Montpellier morning has managed to slant its way down through the narrow Rue de la Carbonnerie, under the edges of his curtains and into his room, where it's now streaking the tastefully decorated walls with bright, golden blades. 

Sherlock gropes for his watch and is surprised to find it’s already eight twenty-five. (A full night’s sleep is a delicious rarity these days.) (Must have been the pre-bed bath.)

(Or Billy’s photo of John, looking thin and wretched.)

Sherlock sits up in bed and reaches for his phone, keen to take another look, but finds there’s another unopened message awaiting him.

_Text: You said double, right? Cuz this is CLEAR. Attached. Dr W last night. B_

Impatiently, Sherlock taps the attachment icon. Two figures appear on his screen but he’s only interested in the one on the left. He zooms in and, as John’s face gets bigger and clearer, for a moment, he’s too overcome with emotion to do anything other than stare. It’s been almost twelve full months - a lifetime - since he last saw that face, and as he studies the worry lines on John’s forehead, the slant of his brows - his eyes, his nose, his jaw, his mouth - want surges up in him, a physical need to feel John’s body against his, and to hold it close.

He zooms out again. If he can’t yet touch John's body, he needs to see it, at least - but now he notices the other person in the shot. (A woman. Taller than John.) (Good posture, large feet. Slim but muscular body. Someone who doesn’t spend a lot of time sitting behind a desk.) (She’s laughing, her eyes fixed on John’s.)

(And John is smiling back.)

Despite the warmth of the room, a chill goes up Sherlock’s spine. (This is fear, dread.) (John wouldn’t … he absolutely would not …)

(I won’t let him.) 

An icy sense of purpose fills Sherlock. He throws back the bedclothes and dresses quickly. Phones reception to order a taxi. Drags his suitcase out from under the bed. Packs his things - _all_ of his things - with methodical precision, taking particular care with his clothing. When he reaches his destination, there will be no wrinkles or unwanted creases. His purple shirt will be as sharp as it ever was, and the lines of his Italian wool suit every bit as uncompromisingly severe. 

Because it would appear that John Watson needs a few things made clear to him.

Waiting for the lift down to reception, Sherlock texts a quick reply to Billy.

_Text: Payment for photo in person. Soon. SH_

 


	2. Heart Murmurs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock returns to London and manages to see John - but neither go quite the way he'd hoped.

**_Montpellier, France - Monday, April 8th_ **

 

 

The hotel lift announces its arrival at the ground floor with a muted chime. The sound is discreet enough that most guests manage to filter it out within hours of checking in, but newcomers invariably look around to see where it’s coming from. Today is no exception: the man waiting at Reception (mid-thirties, well-dressed, athletic build - something in P.R.) turns at once, dark eyes scanning the room. His gaze meets Sherlock’s and for a split second, Sherlock sees something in them - something he doesn’t like. (Surprise? Interest? No, that's _recognition_. He's one of Mycroft's spies!) Sherlock quickly kicks his suitcase further back into the lift and out of sight with his heel, giving what he hopes is a convincing performance of a man who’s realized he’s stupidly left something important in his room (screw up eyes, twist mouth, snap fingers) before slamming a hand against the Up button again. (Mycroft’s spy can’t have seen the case, can he? No, not from that angle.) (And just how many spies does Mycroft have here anyway? No wonder government spending is soaring - his departmental budget could do with some serious trimming.)

Ten minutes later, Sherlock is travelling back down in the lift again. (There’s no time to waste.) (Have to see John, have to see him soon - before he does something stupid.) To his great relief, the only people in the foyer this time are the receptionist and one of the chambermaids. He settles his bill in cash (credit cards are so easily traced) and after that, it’s a just short (if infuriatingly London-like in its weaving complexity) taxi ride to the Gare Saint-Roch. Sherlock sits on the edge of his seat the whole time, suitcase on the floor beside him instead of in the boot, Euros for the fare ready in his hand, as he checks off the passing streets compulsively (Rue Foch, Boulevard Ledru Rollin, Rue Marceau, Cours Gambetta …) (From here, it should take no more than five minutes.) (Damn that ambulance! Okay, make that five _and a half_ minutes.)

Montpellier’s infuriating one-way system obliges the taxi to turn right onto the Rue du Grand-Saint-Jean, then left to double back on itself before it can gain access Rue du Pagezy and the station. Sherlock checks his watch again. (Half-past twelve. Plenty of time. The Lille Flandres train doesn’t depart until 13.02.) (Even so, these needless delays are annoying.) He huffs out an impatient breath: if this had been any other day of the week, he’d have been en route hours ago. He wants to be out of Montpellier - out of France - _now_. Before Mycroft gets wind of his departure. (At least with rail travel - unlike flying - there aren't any ID checkpoints.) (Unless you’re stupid enough to buy your tickets with a credit card.)

At last the taxi pulls up. Sherlock presses the fare plus an absurdly generous tip into the driver’s hand almost before the man has time to engage the handbrake, then leaps out of the vehicle and cuts a purposeful swathe through the crowds of dithering tourists and would-be rail passengers milling about outside the station. Once inside, he looks around for a litter bin. (The phone will have to go.) (GPS makes Mycroft’s job too easy these days.) He spots one to the left of the ticket office. (One of those new anti-terrorism ones: a transparent plastic bag, suspended from a metal ring with a lid). (No good, no good!) But there’s no time to go looking further afield and so, as he queues for a ticket, he surreptitiously slips his Blackberry into a sheaf of travel information leaflets on a nearby revolving stand. With any luck, and French exit checks notwithstanding, Mycroft will have no idea he’s left Montpellier until he’s through customs and immigration at Dover.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_London, England_ **

 

 

It’s making the student nurse assisting him almost jump out of her skin that finally forces John to admit that not only is he in a bad mood, but he’s also letting it show. He could blame his ill-humour on being sleep-deprived - he only managed a couple of hours last night, and a broken and twitchy two hours at that - but tiredness isn’t the cause: it’s anger.

Anger at bloody Mycroft for a start. The more John thinks about the papers missing from the report into Sherlock’s death, the more convinced he is that Mycroft is somehow behind their disappearance. It would be typical of him and John can just picture him, stuffing the pages under his coat, smiling that supercilious, weaselly smile.

There’s anger at Lestrade too, for his stupidity and disloyalty. How the hell can he possibly think Sherlock was a fraud? The man is supposed to be a policeman - a _Detective Inspector_ , for god’s sake - but he it turns out wouldn’t know hard evidence if it came up and shook hands with him. How many cases has Sherlock solved for him? Dozens! And yet … John grinds his teeth, remembering the previous night’s conversation. _He went and offed himself, didn’t he? Why would he have done a thing like that if he hadn’t been faking all along?_

Worse still, there’s anger at Sherlock. Anger at his stupid protective streak, at his bloody arrogance in insisting on taking on Moriarty alone. Anger at his not trusting John enough to tell him what he was planning, at not treating him like an equal …

“I don't think anything's broken,” the little nurse is lamenting, "but it'll all have to be sterilized again now, won't it?"

John looks at her. She’s down on the emergency room floor, crawling about on her hands and knees, miserably gathering up the suture tray, needles, forceps and scissors she knocked flying a minute ago - but that was John's fault not hers: he'd taken his brewing temper out one of the cupboard doors, banging it shut with a furious growl and far more force than necessary. Assailed by guilt, he drops into a crouch beside her to help.

“I’m so clumsy,” she says, full of gloom.

“No,” John insists. “These things happen, Nurse ... it's Nurse Weir, isn't it? It wasn’t your fault.”

She smiles gratefully, but looks no more convinced than he imagines he would himself if someone tried telling him Sherlock’s death wasn’t _his_ fault - because the truth is, he’s angry at himself too. He should have been suspicious of that phone call summoning him to Mrs Hudson’s death-bed. He should have known what Sherlock was planning, and somehow prevented it. And, more than that, he should have been enough of a reason for Sherlock to go on living …

John straightens up and clears his throat. “Just going to check on some paperwork,” he announces, turning towards the door. “Put those instruments in the autoclave, and tidy up a bit. I’ll be back soon.”

He doesn’t wait for an answer. He needs air. He’s pretty sure there aren’t any patients still waiting to be seen but even if there are, in his current state, he probably wouldn’t do them much good. Better to take a few minutes’ breather.

The automatic doors slide open noiselessly and he steps out onto the street, inhaling deeply and telling himself he’s a grown man; he ought to be coping with his grief better than this. Disbelief and Anger are supposed to be _early_ stage reactions to a death. Anyone normal would have moved onto Depression by now. They might even be through it and heading for Acceptance. John plonks himself down on the low wall opposite the ambulance bay and sighs. He’s doing it all wrong. He should never have started the process with a nervous breakdown.

“John!” a female voice exclaims. “I was just coming to see you.”

It’s Mary. She sits down on the wall next to him.

“Uh, hello,” John manages, trying to look and sound like a half-way competent professional instead of a man being driven out of his mind by rage and despair. "What are you, uh ... Did you want something?"

“You haven’t forgotten, have you?” she asks, head cocked to one side.

John frowns, shakes his head. “No. Not at all. Sorry, what?”

“We were going to talk to Mycroft Holmes - or at least you were. You haven’t changed your mind, have-”

Mycroft’s name, and the prospect of a target for his anger, snaps John’s mind into clearer focus. “No, no,” he insists. “I’ll talk to him. He's really not that scary, once you get to know him. I think I suggested Thursday, didn’t I?”

Mary pulls an apologetic face. “Sorry. I can’t manage Thursday. The Chief’s sending us on some health and safety course up in Manchester. What about Wednesday? First thing in the morning?”

John nods. He swapped Wednesday shifts with Dan Coyle only this morning, so he knows he’s free.

Mary smiles. “And would you know where to find Mr Holmes?”

"I can think of a couple of places to try," John tells him, relishing thoughts of raising hell in the Diogenes Club.

Mary gets to her feet, smiling. “Good! Okay then, I’ll pick you up at about eight-thirty.”

She’s so briskly positive, it’s easy to be swept along, and John finds himself scribbling down his address on the notepad she offers him.

After she’s gone, the doubts set in. Will he really be able to face Mycroft? And even if he can, will he be capable of getting answers out of him?

And just how long a sentence do you get for murdering a man in cold blood these days?

 

* * * * * * * *

 

An obstacle on the track just north of Paris means Sherlock’s train is thirty minutes late arriving in Calais. It’s 9pm already, and he hurtles across town, heedless of the damage he may be inflicting on the ankles of passers-by as he tows his case over to the P&O Offices. He needn’t have hurried: when he gets there, he discovers there’s a stupid rule that foot-passengers must check in at least forty-five minutes before their ferry departs, meaning the earliest ferry he can board leaves at 21.45 which doesn’t arrive in Dover until 23.15. He does a quick calculation: assuming minimal hold-ups at customs, he could be back in London at … 1am. He curses. South Eastern trains long ago ceased considering it financially viable to run trains at that time of night; he’ll either have to stay in Dover, or hire a taxi. Taxi it is then, and never mind the cost: Mycroft has deep pockets.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

John has spent the past three hours aimlessly flicking through TV channels, watching repeats. He often does. Well, they pass the time. Mostly he watches programmes he grew up with - _Minder_ , _The Sweeney_ , _The Professionals_. Some of them he’s seen so many times, he can remember almost all of the dialogue but there’s something comforting in that. No nasty surprises, just the reassurance of knowing that, even if the ending isn’t one hundred percent happy, the main characters will still be standing, and in the next episode they’ll be back, doing their jobs in the same old way.

He switches off the telly and takes his dinner plate to the kitchen.

Time for bed, and tomorrow, he’ll go back to doing his job, in the same old way.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

The ferry is busier than Sherlock expected, although - with the exception of a couple of school parties (noisy, hyped-up teenage boys, shrieking teenage girls) - it’s quiet. Turning up the collar of his coat to obscure his face (you never know who might be about), he tucks himself into a window seat in one of the starboard lounges, well out of earshot of the rampaging hormones and excitement. All around him, people are quietly dozing: men with big guts and faded baseballs caps (long distance lorry drivers); the denims and long-hair brigade (gap year students); men and women in sober casual clothes, lace-up boots, khaki backpacks (members of Her Majesty’s Armed Forced on leave). (Did John ever travel like this?) Sherlock closes his eyes, and allows himself a brief fantasy in which his twenty-something year-old self bumps into a tanned young army medic, his hair bleached blond by the sun, on an overnight ferry, and the two of them sneak away from the noise and bustle of ordinary travellers and shut themselves in one of those rooms intriguingly marked ‘private’ …

 

He must have drifted off to sleep, because the next thing he knows, a not very alarming alarm is sounding, and a crackly recorded message is instructing drivers to return to their vehicles. Sherlock stretches, stifles a yawn and adjusts his collar. His mouth feels dry, his eyes gritty. Thinking longingly of his own bed in Baker Street, and even more longingly of finding John in it, he goes to join the ragged queue of bleary-eyed foot passengers waiting to disembark. A young squaddie knocks a rucksack as stuffed and hard as a punchbag into his, but for John’s sake, Sherlock brushes away the instant apology with a shrug and a smiled assurance that “It’s fine.”

The queue starts to move, shuffling forward like zombies into the night, somnolent feet catching on the struts of the ramp taking them down into Dover. There are more queues at Immigration, of course, despite the promise held out by a sign beckoning ‘UK Passport Holders ONLY’ but, for once in his life, Sherlock finds the waiting not boring but unpleasantly stimulating. With every step nearer the control desks, his heart beats faster and his palms grow damper. If Mycroft is going to stop him, it’ll be here.

The dreaded moment of handing over his passport and watching that little streak of green light scan his biometric image arrives. The unsmiling immigration officer behind the desk glances at his passport, then his face. Sherlock holds his breath, stares back (he knows who I am, he knows who I am. Oh shit, shit, shit, shit, shit-) and the man waves him through without a word. Sherlock is gleeful, triumphant, but does his very best not to smile.

Outside, there’s yet another queue for taxis. Sherlock takes his place in it, turning up his collar again, but this time against the cold. (Dover in April at night is much less balmy than Montpellier - or Mecca, or Khartoum, for that matter.) (Although it compares reasonably well with Norway.) One by one, his fellow passengers slip into taxis of all shapes, and sizes, and colours, and then it’s his turn. An elegant black car pulls into the kerb. (Mercedes E-class, Avantgarde, 4 doors, tinted windows, bi-xenon headlamps.) (Forty thousand quids’ worth new, though this one's got an 08 plate, so it's only worth half that.) (The badly applied Dover Taxis decal's probably taken a couple of thousand off its resale value too.)

Leaving the driver to deposit his case in the boot, Sherlock gets into the car and settles himself on the back seat, but no sooner has he fastened his seatbelt than the other passenger door opens and someone else gets into the car. The door slams shut, the engine roars into life and Sherlock has just enough time to register a huge figure clad in black before his arm is seized in a vice-like grip. Twisting violently, he struggles against it, but a folded cloth comes down over his nose and mouth, filling his nostrils with the sweet, dangerous scent of chloroform, and then there's nothing but blackness and the sickening sensation of falling ...

 

* * * * * * * *

 

_**Tuesday, April 9th - 2.15 a.m.** _

 

 

Every time Sherlock tries to open his eyes, there’s nothing but shards of blinding light, piercing through to the back of his brain. He feels nauseous, disoriented … and his head hurts. He raises a tentative hand to it. (It moves freely. No shackles or ties, then.) (Whoever did this is sure there'll be no violence, no attempts at escape.)

“Ah, you’re awake. How are you feeling, hmm?” (Oh, _that_ explains everything. There's only one person that cloyingly solicitous tone could belong to.)

“Mycroft!” Sherlock prises his eyes open again, and keeps them open, even if can’t help flinching at the savagely bright light.

“The very same,” Mycroft purrs. “Does the head hurt, hmm? I’m afraid Mandy was obliged to give you a little injection as well as the chloroform. You would keep trying to escape.”

(Mandy? One of Mycroft’s glossy ‘assistants’ did _this_?) Sherlock shakes his head in an attempt to clear it and sits up straighter, looking about as his eyes grow accustomed to the light. (Mycroft’s office.) (Of course.) (Stupid! The smell of Antiquax Lavender furniture polish and the all-pervasive scent of Darjeeling should have made that obvious.) Beyond Mycroft’s desk, leaning against the far wall, incongruously casual and bulky beside Mycroft’s formal portrait of the Queen, there’s a grim-faced man with a neck almost as thick as Mycroft’s thigh. (Which is still plump, despite all the dieting.) (Must point that out to him soon.)

Mandy's sheer size makes Sherlock feel slightly less annoyed with himself for having failed to fight him off and, heartened, he attempts standing. It’s a mistake. His legs tremble and give way, forcing him to sink back into the chair.

“Ah, yes,” Mycroft nods. “You might have been given the merest soupçon of clarisoprodol. Best to remain seated for a while, if you don't want to end up face down on the carpet.”

(You'd think someone who'd just admitted to having their own brother injected with a muscle relaxant might have the grace to look shame-faced about it, but not Mycroft!) (No, _he's_ grinning like a Cheshire cat.) Seething, Sherlock manages to clench his hands into fists but immediately realizes he wouldn’t be able to put any power behind the punch he’s itching to land on Mycroft’s smug nose, so he stays seated, boiling with rage and plotting vengeance.

Mycroft glides over to his sideboard where a teapot, cups and saucers are neatly arranged on a silver tray. “Cup of cha, brother dear?” he suggests, lifting the teapot.

“I don’t _want_ tea,” Sherlock growls at him. “I want to go home.”

“All in good time,” Mycroft replies, pouring tea anyway. “But in the meantime, you and I need a little chat.”

“ _Do_ we?”

“We do,” Mycroft smiles, handing Sherlock his tea. (A smile that goes on too long, so that, in the end, it’s all teeth and carnivorous stare.) “Thank you, Mandy.” Mycroft makes a little shooing motion with his free hand, and ‘Mandy’ peels slowly away from the wall, like skin sloughing off a lizard, and he stomps obediently out of the room, casting Sherlock one last implacable glare as he goes.

When the door shuts behind him, Mycroft pours a second cup of tea and moves to prop himself up against the front of his desk, legs crossed at the ankles, facing Sherlock.

“ _Well_?” Sherlock challenges, all too aware he sounds like a sulky teenager.

“We had an agreement,” Mycroft says, ladling on the disappointment and disapproval.

“I changed my mind.”

Mycroft blows on his tea and makes soft, clucking sounds. “Sherlock, Sherlock … Don’t you remember? How distraught you were? When you realized Moriarty might kill him?”

Sherlock winces. (Yes. _Obviously_. It’s not the kind of thing you forget.)

“It impaired your judgement, didn’t it?”

(Yes.)

“And you’d have done it too, wouldn’t you? If you'd had to. To save him.”

Sherlock doesn’t answer. (Stating the obvious is tiresome.)

“Well, thank goodness for Miss Hooper, is all I can say,” Mycroft sighs. “Hidden depths, that one.”

“Yes,” Sherlock concedes. (Molly was wonderful - positive, fast-thinking, and utterly selfless.)

Mycroft sets his cup and saucer down on the desk and leans forward, his expression kind now. (The _bastard_.) “You’ve given up everything for him, Sherlock - your work, your reputation, _everything_. Don’t put your _life_ \- and his - at risk again.”

Sherlock puts his cup and saucer down too, and rubs his face with his hands. He’s tired, drugged and coshed, and everything hurts. Especially the tightness in his chest. 

Mycroft pushes up from the desk and comes nearer to lay a hand on his shoulder. “You miss him, I know.” He pauses, and sucks in air thoughtfully between his teeth. “How about a compromise?”

Sherlock looks up at him. “What kind of compromise?”

“You stay away from John - completely out of sight - until things are safer. It shouldn’t take long. A week, probably - two at most.”

“And then?”

“Then you may do as you like.”

Sherlock considers. He’s waited a year; another fortnight shouldn’t be impossible. (And if it _is_ , well, Mycroft can go to hell.) “All right.”

Mycroft beams and claps his hands together. “Excellent! That’s settled then. Come along - I’ll show you your new quarters.”

“My what?”

“Oh, have I never mentioned it? I have a modest little flat, here, in the building. One of the perks of serving Her Majesty in my minor capacity, and since you can't go back to Baker Street yet … It won't be quite what you’re used to, I know - it's definitely no 221B - but it’s only temporary. I’m sure you’ll make do.”

Sherlock gets to his feet, only for the room to spin unhelpfully. As he puts out a hand to steady himself, Mycroft steps in beside him, an arm about his waist to support him. (It’s almost like being a kid again.) Sherlock bristles, tries to pull away, but it’s no good: without Mycroft’s help, he’s not going to make it even as far as the door, let alone to Mycroft’s grace and favour flat.

 

A few minutes later, after they’ve made halting progress down the oak-panelled hallway outside Mycroft’s office, followed by a more graceful ascent in the lift to a floor Sherlock had no idea existed before, Mycroft opens the door to his flat. Sherlock finds himself unable to hold back a laugh. (Mycroft’s notion of ‘modest’ is clearly a very broad one.) (Ditto his notion of ‘a flat’.) The living room is twice the size of the one at Baker Street, the carpet pale and thick. There’s a gleaming brass fireplace, and a huge, leather three-piece suite. The bedroom - incredibly - is more luxurious still: an Emperor bed and Tiffany lamps, bespoke fitted wardrobes, and what looks suspiciously like a lesser-known work by Constable on the wall above the bed.

“Can you manage on your own now?” Mycroft asks.

“No thanks to you,” Sherlock mutters.

Mycroft gives a bright little laugh. “Yes, well, I'll leave you to it, then, shall I?"

Sherlock sits down on the bed and toes off his shoes. When he looks up again, Mycroft is on his way out of the room, already on his mobile and issuing orders.

“Bentley? Something’s come up. We need to bring Operation Horus forward. Tomorrow.” He snaps his phone shut again and looks back at Sherlock over his shoulder. "Sleep well, Sherlock. We'll have a _proper_ talk about this in the morning."

 

* * * * * * * *

 

It's 8.05 am – well before his shift starts – and John is already sitting at his desk, a steaming cup of take-away coffee beside him. He’s in early because something about that woman with the fractured humerus yesterday has been niggling away at him all night. It was a clean break, and easy to set, but he can’t shake the feeling that he missed something. He's just called up her x-rays, when the consulting room door opens and a face peers around it. A face that belongs to Jack Hughes, one of John’s more jovial colleagues.

“Oh, good - you’re here,” he says. “Someone to see you in Reception. A _female_ someone.” He waggles his eyebrows suggestively. “Bit of a looker, too.”

“I don’t suppose you got a name?" John asks. "Mary? Mary Morstan?”

Pursing his lips, Jack shakes his head. “Not even close.” Then he chuckles, deep in his throat. “You’re a bit of a dark horse, aren’t you, John Watson? All this coming in early to review your notes, and always being willing to cover if someone needs time off. A person could easily think you're a man with no life when, in fact … just how many good-looking women are likely to come looking for you unexpectedly? Enquiring minds need to know.”

Once upon a time, John might have responded to a comment like Jack's with a roguish smile of his own; he might even have winked. But not any more. “Just tell me who it is, Jack.”

Still giving him the kind of look that says he’s having to reassess everything he thought he knew about him, Jack grins. “She said her name's Molly. Molly Hooper. Pretty little thing, isn’t she?”

“Pathologist,” John corrects.

“Lucky old you,” Jack laughs. “Pretty _and_ she knows what do with a stiff one.”

“Out!”

With a cheeky salute, Jack withdraws, letting the door bang shut behind him. John quickly bookmarks the x-rays he was looking at and logs out, wondering what Molly wants. The pub quiz wasn’t exactly an unqualified success; she surely can’t be going to suggest they do it again.

He finds her sitting all alone in the waiting area, chewing on a finger nail. When she sees him, she jumps up immediately and hurries over but once she’s standing in front of him, she turns hesitant, looking down at the floor and shuffling her feet. “Um, hello.”

It’s not an encouraging start. “Hello,” John responds, non-committal.

Molly takes a deep breath. “I wanted to talk to you. About Sunday.”

It wasn’t her fault, John knows, but he’s still angry. “If Lestrade has something to say to me, he can say it himself,” he replies tersely.

Molly does a double-take, then gives a short laugh. “Oh. No. Not about that.” Her face turns quickly turns serious again. “Not that I’m _not_ sorry about that. And Greg is too, of course. He didn’t mean to upset you but-”

“ _Molly_ ,” John interrupts, before she can fly off on a tangent he has no hope of following, “what _did_ you want to talk to me about?”

Molly worries at her bottom lip with her teeth. “Mary.”

 _Oh god, this_. John sighs, adjusts his stance. “Look, Molly - Mary’s nice, I like her-”

“You _like_ her!” Molly cries, eyes wide. She looks horrified - scandalized, even. “You _can’t_.” Her whole body stiffens, and she clamps her arms rigidly to her sides, but her hands are vibrating - like those of an excited child who's trying not to blurt out something it really wants to say but knows it shouldn’t. “If Sherlock wasn’t dead, you wouldn’t though, would you? Like her?”

John grits his teeth. “But he _is_ dead."

“Yes, I know. But if he wasn’t? You wouldn’t like Mary then, would you?”

John frowns. He’s confused now. “I thought you wanted me to like her. Isn’t that why you invited her along?”

Molly rolls her eyes. “That was Greg’s idea, actually. He said when he was in hospital, you seemed sad. Lonely. I told him not to, but he wouldn’t listen.”

“He thought I should be moving on by now?” John asks bitterly. “Not still pining away for a fake?”

“He loves you,” Molly says, so suddenly that for a moment John thinks she means Lestrade. But then he sees how wistful she looks, how envious, and it feels like his heart might break all over again. “ _Loved_ you. Did he ever say it to your face? No, don't answer that: I know he didn't. He wouldn’t have: he was - like that. But he did. He would have done _anything_ for you.”

John knows. He _remembers _. Their first time … the riding crop ... Sherlock hadn't wanted to, but he'd pushed himself through his uncertainty, through the shock of what he was doing, because John had _needed_ him to. He remembers Sherlock's hot kisses afterwards, and the hard press of his body, hunger in it at last. He remembers Sherlock's obsessive concern too, and his unexpected, endearing protectiveness - but mostly he remembers the way everything came together perfectly, just when he'd been so afraid it would all fall apart.__

__"I know," he manages, his throat thick with emotion. If Molly has any pity in her, she'll stop. _Now_._ _

__She doesn’t. “It’s too soon, for you to be thinking about - about being with someone else, isn’t it?”_ _

__“What the hell do you think?” John demands, but it comes out wrong - not angry, but broken._ _

__“I’m sorry. ” Molly’s mouth twists and she blinks rapidly, as if to ward off tears. “I just … I needed to know.”_ _

__“No, _I’m_ sorry,” John says, wanting to hug her, but not trusting either of them to be able to hold it together if he does. “You loved him too.”_ _

Molly nods, a stiff little movement of her head, then she sniffs, and tosses her hair back over her shoulder, forcing herself to stand taller. “But I couldn’t give him what he needed. You could.” She smiles weakly. “I-I should go.” She leans in, kisses John on the cheek and hurries off.

John watches her go, wondering for a moment what the hell just happened.  


 

* * * * * * * *

 

Sherlock awakes far later than he'd intended, still feeling groggy. His first instinct is to get up anyway; then, remembering his 'agreement' with Mycroft, he punches his pillow and tries to get comfortable again, but after a few minutes tossing and turning, it occurs to him that agreement under duress is no agreement at all: it's coercion. He throws back the bedclothes, and dives into Mycroft's shower.

Five minutes later, freshly washed, and with his hair still pleasantly damp and cooling, he emerges feeling a lot better. A quick scrub of his teeth and a rinse with Mycroft's mouthwash (for sensitive teeth and gums), and he's almost back to normal. He looks around for his suitcase, but it's nowhere to be seen. (Damn. It must still be in Mycroft's office.) Sherlock throws open Mycroft's wardrobes. Nothing. Well, nothing Sherlock would wear. (Gieves and Hawkes grey sharkskin may be unnervingly appropriate for _Mycroft_ , but it's not exactly Spencer Hart.) He supposes he'll have to wear yesterday's clothes again, minus the underwear. He rummages through Mycroft's drawers for a clean pair of socks, but draws the line at borrowing his Y-fronts. (They'd be too big, anyway.) As he pulls on his jeans, fastening the zip very, very carefully, he finds himself smiling. ('Going commando'.) (John would laugh.) (Or get that lust-fogged look in his eyes.) Sherlock can just imagine it - a little too well, given the proximity of vicious metal teeth to sensitive flesh - but it's enough to convince him that going along with Mycroft's plan would be gross stupidity. He needs to see John _today_ , not some time next week or the week after, and a sudden rush of energy floods his system. He strides over to the flat's front door and throws it open.

Mandy grins down at him. "Going somewhere, Mr Holmes?"

"To see my brother," Sherlock hastily extemporizes, adding with innocently raised eyebrow and in a meek tone designed to forestall any hostility and/or suspicion, “Would you know …? Is he in his office?"

"Yeah," Mandy grunts. "I'll come with you."

Knowing there's no point arguing or resisting (at this stage), Sherlock allows himself to be chaperoned down the hallway and into the lift, then along the corridor to Mycroft's office. (It's all different.) (The layout has changed.) (The post room is now a lounge, full of Parker Knoll chairs - Mycroft is so irredeemably old-fashioned - and there's a bar in one corner.) (And _this_ room used to belong to Mycroft's secretary, but is now full of books and box files - some kind of library-)

Mandy raps on Mycroft's door with a meaty fist and, after a brief silence, an imperious "Come!" summons them in.

Mycroft is not alone. He's consulting with a woman (small, early thirties, neat suit, very short hair and square, horn-rimmed glasses). They're poring over a collection of maps and papers spread out on Mycroft desk which are apparently too interesting for Mycroft to look up from, because he gestures Sherlock into one of the chairs at the side of the room with an impatient flutter of his hand.

Sherlock sits. Watches. Listens.

"White City, sir," the woman is saying, pointing to a spot on the map in front of her. "Then, nothing."

Mycroft's nose wrinkles in distaste and he sniffs. "And the police?"

The woman slants a look in Sherlock's direction and clears her throat pointedly.

Mycroft laughs, a cascade of bright, meaningless sounds. "My brother," he reassures her. "Yes, the new hair colour _is_ a bit of shock, isn't it? He does so love to be dramatic."

Sherlock runs a hand through his hair. It's been ginger for so long now, he's got used to it. He'd almost forgotten it might come as a shock to people used to its natural colour. “It's known as hiding in plain sight,” he mutters, irritably (because Mycroft ought to _know_ , without needing to be told).

The woman blinks at him, evidently surprised. (Although – interestingly – she's not shocked: she doesn't think she's just been introduced to a ghost.) She inclines her head. “Mr Holmes. It's a pleasure to meet you, sir.” Her eyes dart to Mycroft, then back again, and her brows pull together. (She's had an idea). Turning back to Mycroft, she licks her lips. (An idea she's about to share.)

“Sir-”

Mycroft holds up a silencing hand. “ _No_.”

She tries again. “But, _sir_ -”

“My brother,” Mycroft says slowly (leaning on both the possessive pronoun and the familial descriptive in a clear signal for her to back off), “may well have an extraordinary talent for these matters but his involvement is out of the question at present. His life is in danger and it is imperative that each and every one of the Horus targets continues to believe him dead. He must remain hidden and out of sight until they are all safely in custody. Until that time, Bentley, his presence in London is classified information.”

For a moment, Bentley holds Mycroft's gaze (her chin up - defiance - and her brow furrowed - disagreement) but at length, she nods, albeit reluctantly. “Yes, sir.”

Mycroft's expression relaxes a little and he gives her a sympathetic smile. “I'm afraid, however frustrating it may be, we're going to have to leave this one to the Metropolitan Police and hope for the best.”

Bentley nods again and begins gathering up the papers from Mycroft's desk but he stops her.

“I think I'll peruse the information once more and see if I can't point the Chief Inspector in the right direction. After all, it would never do to have our brave boys in blue making complete fools of themselves over this, would it? Not once the media get wind of it."

Bentley smiles, as if she thinks Mycroft is not just the cleverest man in London (he _is_ ), but the wittiest too (he really _isn't_ ). Smiling back at her and issuing a few muttered instructions Sherlock can't quite catch, Mycroft shows her to the door, ushering Mandy out at the same time, then turns to Sherlock, his face a study in concern.

Sherlock braces himself. (Great. It's apparently time for another brotherly talk.) (What's it going to be this time? Another lecture on the perils of caring?)

"Sherlock," Mycroft begins, pressing his hands together, as if in supplication. "About John ... That is to say, about _you_ and John-". He stops, abruptly. Clenches his jaw, closes his eyes. "Damn."

(Damn?)

"What?" Sherlock demands.

"I'm sorry." Mycroft shakes his head. "Memory like a sieve. I really must ... It's very important ... " He throws open a drawer, pulls out an envelope. "Listen - stay there. I'll be back very shortly." He crosses the room and opens the door. "I'll have someone bring you coffee."

And just like that, he disappears.

Sherlock stares at the door for a moment. (It's unguarded. And Mycroft's not here any more. There's nothing to prevent-) He gets up quickly - so quickly that one of the papers on Mycroft's desk is dislodged and sails slowly to the floor. Sherlock picks it up, scanning the text out of habit.

It's a police report - the initial findings of a CID team investigating the disappearance, two hours before their arrival, of a person under uniformed police guard. The identity of the person is indicated by initials only - JD - and the location of the disappearance as GS1/TVC.

Sherlock crosses to the desk. Rifles through the papers. It doesn't take long to confirm that TVC stands for Television Centre, and GS1 for Guest Star Dressing Room 1. Digging deeper through the documents, his fingers encounter glossy paper. (A photograph!) He pulls it out, just as the office door opens again and Mycroft walks in.

For a moment, they just stare at each other, then Mycroft frowns.

"Put that down," he orders.

"Put what down?" Sherlock replies."This?" He brandishes the photograph. "I didn't realize you were a Julian Dyer fan. In fact, I seem to recall you describing him as facile and superficial."

Pulling himself taller, Mycroft advances on Sherlock, unsmiling, his chin tucked in and nostrils flaring, maintaining eye contact. (He looks like a bull, about to charge. It's his Intimidating Approach, honed early in his teens.) (In some ways it works better now - he's more powerful, less easily taunted - but in others, it's much less effective: there's less physical weight behind the threat these days.) Even so, Sherlock finds himself tensing up, just as he always did when they were children and Mycroft discovered him messing with his things.

"Give it to me?" Mycroft purrs, hand extended. (The rising inflection makes it sound like an entreaty, but it isn't: it's an order.)

Sherlock slaps it down onto his upturned palm. "Going to sleep with it under your pillow?"

Mycroft smiles nastily. "We don't all bat for the other side, Sherlock."

Ignoring the jibe (whatever else Mycroft is, he's not a homophobe - this is just part of the dance), Sherlock jerks his head in the direction of Mycroft's scattered papers. "So, he's gone missing and the police have no idea where to find him."

A series of comical little muscle contractions works its way across Mycroft's face as he tries to suppress shock, irritation and embarrassment. "Yes," he concedes, eventually, the word a long, slow hiss.

"Why do _you_ care?"

Mycroft throws back his head and barks out a laugh. "I know you've been out of the country for a while, Sherlock, but you really should try to keep up with popular culture. The man is a National Treasure. Were anything to happen to him, there would be candlelit vigils all over the place. Sobbing. Maudlin ballads." He shudders. "And flowers - endless bunches of flowers and hand-written goodbye notes littering the streets. You know what that kind of thing does to the traffic."

" ' _Were_ ' anything to happen? You think he's still alive?"

"I'm-" Mycroft begins, then stops himself. He takes a breath, stretches out his neck and forces a smile. "Let's hope so."

(There's something he's not saying, something he's trying to hide.) Sherlock studies Mycroft's face: there are tension lines around the mouth and between the brows, a slight tremor at one corner of the mouth, excessive blinking ... "You're upset!"

Mycroft closes his eyes, tosses his head. "Don't be ridiculous. I told you-"

" _Mycroft_ ," Sherlock urges softly, almost worried now.

Mycroft turns back to him with what can only be called a brave smile, and Sherlock's chest tightens uncomfortably. (Mycroft is a complete git most of the time, annoying and interfering and pretentious, not to mention an absolute nightmare of an older brother, but ...)

"We were at school together," Mycroft says in the smallest of voices, and his eyes take on a far-away look. "Children can be so cruel to fa- ... to anyone who's different. Not that I need to tell _you_ that. Julian was kind to me. The nearest thing I had to a friend for years."

(God damn him.) (God damn Mycroft to hell.) Sherlock grits his teeth, all hope of seeing John today fading fast. "D'you want me to help?"

Mycroft sniffs and shakes his head. "It's too dangerous. If anyone were to see you-"

"I could help from here," Sherlock offers. "God knows, if I _have_ to stay cooped up, I could do with something to occupy my mind. And it wouldn't be the first case I've solved without stirring from my chair. John and I had a system. Decided there was no point in my leaving the flat for anything less than a seven."

There's a brief hesitation and then - horrifyingly - Sherlock finds himself being _hugged_. By _Mycroft_. Fortunately, Mycroft swiftly realizes what he's doing and releases him with an awkward cough.

"Yes. Thank you, Sherlock." He swallows audibly. "That would be most kind of you."

"It would mean you owe me." Sherlock corrects, anxious to get the mood back onto more familiar ground. "Now, get out, and let me read through these papers in peace."

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Microwaved pizza is John's least favourite TV dinner: it’s everything that's bad about the normal kind but with less flavour and texture. Sadly, it was the closest thing to a square meal the corner shop had left. John pokes half-heartedly at the limp slices left on his plate, then decides to call it a day. He'll do some proper shopping tomorrow. Make a list and everything. Get fruit and vegetables, some lean meat. It's just that the last few days have thrown him off-balance. All this thinking about Sherlock, all this _talking_ about Sherlock ...

He switches off the telly, takes his plate and mug into the kitchen, and scrapes the remains of the pizza into the bin. He means to go straight to bed after he's put the crockery into the dishwasher, but as he passes back through the living room, his gaze falls on the last and biggest of his cardboard packing cases. It's still taped up. Still unpacked. Still _safe_. He should leave it that way. He really, really should ...

He rips it open, catching his breath as the familiar smell of 221B rises faintly from the sheets and towels packed away inside. If he pressed any one of them to his nose, he'd be able to smell Sherlock's skin, he knows, but he's not up to that - not yet - so he takes them out carefully, keeping them at arm’s length. They were mostly padding anyway.

Half way down, he finds what he's looking for: the three mementos he salvaged from his life in Baker Street: Sherlock's human skull, wrapped in a couple of tea towels; his framed poster of the Periodic Table … but just looking at it makes his stomach flip over - so badly, he daren't even lift the final item, let alone unwrap it. He's already awash with hopeless wanting and pain. This was a mistake - a huge, stupid mistake. He crams the sheets and towels back into the box, forcing them down hard, but the top won't close properly, the flaps keep springing open again. He battles them for a while, pushing and shoving and swearing, and is on the point of giving up in despair when he spots a couple of heavy medical tomes on a nearby shelf. He lays them down on the lid, and at last it stays shut.

Even so, his hands are still shaking as he gets undressed for bed.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

To Sherlock, sitting at Mycroft’s desk, in Mycroft’s office - in what is effectively Mycroft’s _building_ \- feels mildly transgressive (an unexpected bonus). Disappointingly, none of the steady stream of high-heeled, shapely brunettes Mycroft's instructed to bring him coffee and cakes seems to find it so. Every last one of them has treated him as if he has every right to be here, and has bent over backwards to ensure he has exactly the right amount of caffeine and sugar to keep him going, querying whether he’d like more lights on or fewer, or if he might not prefer a more comfortable chair. (Mycroft’s is an Admiral - padded leather, fully button-backed.)

Sherlock leans back in it, stretching out his legs and flexing his ankles. His muscles feel tight, and now he looks up from the papers he’s been sorting through, he finds his vision is blurred. He rubs his eyes, and consults his watch: quarter-past midnight. This is taking far too long. Time to review the data again.

\- Dyer was booked to appear on BBC One’s _The One Show_ on Friday, 5th April, scheduled to be on air at approximately 7.10pm, immediately after a slot on school sports’ days. He was allocated a private dressing room - GS1, the one nearest to the green room.

\- At 6.15pm he arrived by taxi, complaining of a headache. An intern provided him with aspirin, paracetamol and a glass of water, which he took to his dressing room.

\- At 6.45pm he was called to the Green Room, but failed to respond. It was assumed he was waiting for his headache to abate.

\- At 7.00pm was called to the Green Room again, but again failed to respond.

\- At 7.02pm a runner was sent to knock on his door but got no response.

\- At 7.04pm, security unlocked the dressing room door and found it empty. A chair had been overturned, a glass smashed and one of the wardrobe doors was hanging off its hinges. There were no windows, and no other door - no trap doors in the floor, no false panels in the ceiling. Dyer’s jacket - containing his wallet, credit cards and mobile phone - was hanging on the back of the door.

According to the forensics report, no blood was found at the scene (and since the report didn’t come from Anderson there’s no obvious reason to doubt it). Linen, wool and cotton fibres were found on the furniture and carpets (but the room is in constant use; they could have come from the clothes of any of several hundred celebrities).

(The simplest explanation is that he trashed his own room for some reason and left of his own accord.) (Though why leave his phone and wallet behind?)

Sherlock rises from the chair and begins pacing, palms pressed together, bouncing the edge of his forefingers against his lips. 

(There are four possibilities.)

(One: Dyer didn’t care about his belongings because ... He was distracted? Not thinking straight? He felt a sudden and urgent need to be somewhere else?) (Ask Mycroft if he has mental health issues - or a demanding partner.)

(Two: it was intentional.) (Why would it be intentional?) (He needed to disappear? Perhaps he has debts, problems of some sort …) (Or! He needed to be _more_ visible. He wanted to attract attention, raise his profile and this is a publicity stunt!) (Check online information about him.)

(Three: he was never there. The man in the taxi was a celebrity look-alike, hired to lay a false trail for some reason …) (Why?) (Defamation?) (Consult news and gossip sites.)

(Four: the damage to the dressing room was not of his doing. He was _forced_ to leave but for some reason didn’t put up much of a struggle.) (Because his abductor was someone he knew? Someone he trusted?) (Or perhaps he was threatened? Or someone close to him was?)

(Someone as important to _him_ as-)

Sherlock strides back over to Mycroft’s desk, now even more determined to get to the bottom of this. He shoves the papers into a rough pile and opens Mycroft’s laptop. Logging on presents no difficulties: given their shared childhood, Mycroft’s password is easy enough to guess. (He was always so fond of _The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin_ , long beyond the age when owning a copy should have been an embarrassment to him.) (You’d have thought he’d be grateful for that little Bunsen burner accident, but no, not Mycroft - he had to make a drama out of it.)

After a couple of minutes’ reading, Sherlock finds that Google, Wikipedia and IMDb all agree: Julian Dyer is at the top of his game, beloved by public and critics alike, and greatly in demand. He has a dozen television and film projects lined up, and recently _paid cash_ for an Elizabethan manor house set in three acres of land in Suffolk. (That rules out attention-seeking and financial problems: the man has more than enough fame and fortune.)

Sherlock turns his attention back to Mycroft’s papers: the next obvious line of enquiry is a check on the reliability of the eyewitnesses to Dyer’s presence in the TV studio building but it leads Sherlock up another blind alley. The receptionist was thorough and obtained a signature for the keys she handed over. A police handwriting expert claims, with ninety-nine percent certainty, that the signature is genuine. The intern who provided the drugs and drinking water had previously spent two years working for Lens Unlimited - the company responsible for last year’s Christmas special on Dyer (which, according to the viewing figures, out-performed the Queen’s Christmas message.)

As Sherlock sits, gazing into space, mentally sifting the data again (this case is proving delightfully interesting!), the click of a door knob turning snaps his focus back to the room, and he looks up to see Mycroft walking in, his face grey.

Sherlock leans forward. “Mycroft? What is it? What’s happened?”

Mycroft sighs, and crosses to the sideboard where he pours a large measure of whisky (Talisker) into a tumbler (Waterford Crystal Lismore). He swallows half of it in one gulp before replying. “There’s been a break-in at Dyer’s country estate. Nothing stolen, as far as the police can tell, and fortunately no-one was hurt - the staff were all asleep - but I’m afraid the press has got wind of it. It’ll be all over the papers tomorrow.”

“The publicity might be helpful,” Sherlock suggests, in an attempt at being comforting. “Flush out some new information. Put people on the alert.”

Mycroft sucks his teeth. “Yes, undoubtedly. Unfortunately there’s something else.”

“Something else?”

“There’s been a ransom demand.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Wednesday, April 10th_ **

 

 

At the sound of banging, John jerks awake, shuddering violently and drenched in sweat. At first he has no idea where he is, other than that he’s clearly _not_ in Baker Street. He blinks, turning his head this way and that, and slowly the collection of furniture around him resolves into something recognizable. He’s in a bedroom - his new one, in the new flat. He must have been asleep, dreaming, because Sherlock was there … He rubs his eyes, trying to remember the details despite himself, despite the ghastly difference between his dreamworld in which Sherlock was still alive, and the _real_ one in which he is not.

… Sherlock was conducting an experiment, with his usual ruthless focus. He’d noticed - despite John’s best efforts not to let it show - that using certain tones of voice, certain words, did wicked things to John’s libido. From there, it had been only a short step to his deducing it should be possible to bring John to orgasm through words alone and, full of scientific zeal, he’d set about testing his hypothesis - telling John, in toe-curling detail, all the things he was planning to do to him and predicting, with merciless accuracy, exactly how John would react. _Face down, over my desk… Not too hard, but not too gently either, because you like to feel it afterwards, don’t you, John? … You’ll catch your breath at the first touch of my hand; your head will arch back and every muscle in your body will tense up - particularly in your shoulders and up the back of your thighs - but you’ll force them to relax again because you still like to imagine you can hide things from me, that I don’t know exactly what I’m doing to you ..._

In John;s dream, it had been devastatingly effective.

And in real life ... under the bedclothes, John’s hand drifts to his groin, and finds it hot, damp and sticky. He doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Even _dead_ , Sherlock can still make him come like a teenager.

The banging sounds again - louder, more insistent. Bloody hell, there’s someone at the door! What day is it again? Oh god, it must be Mary.

“Coming!” John yells in the general direction of the front door, his unfortunate choice of words making his mouth twist wryly. He pulls on his modesty-saving thick dressing gown, ties it firmly at the waist and, after hastily straightening the bedclothes, goes to let her in.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Standing under Mycroft’s shower, watching the water swirl around his feet, Sherlock decides he needs to visit the BBC's White City studios. Without direct experience of the building, without getting a proper feel for it, all he’ll be able to offer Mycroft by way of explanation for Dyer’s disappearance will be a range of possibilities, not a clear-cut certainty.

He dries himself off and dresses, throwing open the curtains as he finishes buttoning up his shirt front. Outside, Scotland Place is bathed in spring sunshine, making the Portland stone buildings gleam whiter and the double-deckers down on Whitehall shine a brighter red. Fastening the buttons at his cuffs, he takes a moment to gaze down at the traffic and people, at his fellow Londoners going about their daily lives. It’s good to be home again.

He’s almost smiling to himself, feeling a warm glow of near-contentment (there’s work to be done), tinged with excitement (at this very moment John is no more than seven miles away), when down on the street, he spots two figures walking briskly along the pavement: a woman (solid plantar deposition, toes turned out slightly, her gait confident and authoritative) and a man (straight-backed, arms swinging) ( _marching_ , not walking). 

Sherlock’s heart leaps (It’s him, it really is. It’s _John_!) and he presses himself right up against the window to get a better look, cursing the elevation of the building and the sharp angle which makes it impossible to see exactly where John is going.

Craning his neck, standing on tip-toes … nothing helps. (And now John has disappeared from view!) Sherlock seethes with frustration at the injustice of it. (So near, and yet so far.) A moment later, he laughs out loud. John is inside the building. He _has_ to be: if he’d carried on walking, he’d still be visible! Sherlock thrusts his feet into his shoes, heedless of the damage he may be doing to their precision-stitched backs, grabs his jacket and, feeling absurdly pleased to be wearing clean, crease-free clothing, races to the door.

For the second day in a row, he’s met by Mandy - and has to swiftly revise his escape plan. (Play along. Pretend to be heading for Mycroft’s office, overpower him in the lift, and then hit the button for the ground floor instead.)

“Good morning, Mr Holmes,” Mandy beams, smug in his superior strength.

“Good morning, Mandy!” Sherlock beams back, smugger still, and together they walk towards the lift.

Sherlock can hardly contain his anticipation as he watches the lights above the door flash floor numbers - 2, 3, 4, 5 - and by the time the number changes to 6 and the doors open, his heart is positively hammering. Mandy waits for him to enter, then steps in behind him. No sooner have the doors closed again, than Sherlock puts his plan into action. He spins around and deals Mandy a sucker punch to the solar plexus that doubles him over and leaves him gasping for breath. Quick as a flash, Sherlock brings his knee sharply up - right into the base of Mandy’s nose. Mandy howls in pain, but this is payback time - for the taxi in Dover, for the chloroform and the clarisoprodol - and Sherlock follows through with a two-handed crack to the back of the skull that throws Mandy further off balance. Mandy growls, reels, and tries to straighten up, but an uppercut to his chin stops him. There’s a crack as Sherlock’s fist connects with his jaw, and the wet sound of Mandy’s mouth flapping open, then pain flares in Sherlock’s knuckles and Mandy is falling, collapsing backwards against the lift wall and sliding to the floor.

(Job done.)

Brushing the palms of his hands against one another in satisfaction, Sherlock steps neatly over the crumpled body at his feet and presses the button for the ground floor but, annoyingly, the lift comes to a halt at the fifth. As the doors slowly open, it soon becomes clear why: Mycroft is standing there, looking tired but focused. It takes him less than a second to assess the situation and, when Sherlock starts frantically pressing buttons (for the fourth, third, second floor - any floor but this), he stamps a foot down between the doors, preventing them from closing again.

There’s a moment’s silence as Mycroft stares down at Mandy’s unconscious form, then he sniffs and asks, in a long-suffering drawl, “Oh dear lord, Sherlock - have you _any_ idea how much it costs to replace a henchman?”

“I didn’t kill him!” Sherlock protests.

“No,” Mycroft agrees, although he hardly looks consoled (and more like he has a nasty smell under his nose), “but you’ve broken him, and you know I can’t bear substandard equipment.”

Sherlock tries desperately to think fast, to come up with any plausible explanation for his having rendered Mandy unconscious that doesn’t involve mentioning John - or indeed imply any reluctance to keep focused on the Dyer case - but under Mycroft’s steely glare, his mind goes blank. Meanwhile his stomach twists in agitation at the thought that every second Mycroft prolongs this interrogation will be one fewer he has to reach John before he's gone again.

“I need you to go back to your quarters, Sherlock,” Mycroft says quietly. “And I need you to stay there.”

“Why?”

Mycroft smiles. “From the evidence - one incapacitated minder and a lift heading for the ground floor - I’d say you already know the answer to that one. Apparently I have an unexpected appointment for talks with a police sergeant and a certain hospital doctor. A hospital doctor I’d prefer didn’t know you were here.”

“You can’t make me,” Sherlock says. (And really, the only way that could have sounded any more childish is if there’d been foot-stamping too.)

Mycroft laughs brightly. “Oh, I most certainly _can_ ,” he crows, then his expression turns glacial. “Don’t make me force you, Sherlock.”

Sherlock weighs the odds. He could try to force his way downstairs, and be arrested before he reaches the third floor; or he could appear to do as he’s told. (Reluctantly. Resentfully.)

(Because it has to look real.)

“Do I have any choice?”

“I’m told a spell in Pentonville can be very bracing,” Mycroft replies. “Particularly for men of your persuasion.”

Sherlock clenches his jaw. “You’re a bastard, Mycroft.”

“I am, rather, aren’t I?” Mycroft returns, completely unruffled. He pats Sherlock lightly on the arm. “Now, run along and make yourself scarce. I’ll call you later, when the coast is clear.”

 

* * * * * * * *

Respect for rank and authority runs deep in John - a useful counterweight, he’s always thought, to the thrill he gets from excitement and danger, and one that served him well through both med school and the army. Even so, it really hadn’t occurred to him to be nervous about _this_ meeting; he’s witnessed far too much childish bickering between the Holmes brothers to be truly intimidated by Mycroft. But Mary - who _hasn’t_ \- seems terrified. She stalled her car twice on the way here, each time babbling a string of high-pitched apologies to John and the drivers behind her; then, when the uniformed flunkie who admitted them to the building said a brisk “Good morning”, she recoiled defensively, as though he’d just accused her of breaking and entering.

John approaches the reception desk. The woman behind it is dark, with long, shiny hair and a lip-glossed smile. She bears an uncanny resemblance to Anthea, but then again - as Sherlock so often pointed out - Mycroft’s assistants usually do. John smiles at her and tells her he needs to see the great man himself. She refuses. John insists. When she refuses again, he politely, but firmly, tells her he’d hate her to get into trouble and that it would probably be in her interests to phone upstairs and mention his name. Mary makes an uncomfortable noise at the back of her throat and eyes the door, as if desperate for escape. Her discomfort is surprising in a police officer, John thinks, but also rather charming: she could probably deal with a gang of roughs all of her own, and yet the prospect of an interview with Mycroft is bringing her out in a cold sweat. 

The receptionist’s call to Mycroft is a very brief one, because almost immediately another tall and stylish brunette appears, with the news that Mr Holmes will see them now.

As they follow in her wake, John finds himself seeing their surroundings through Mary’s eyes - all the subtle, and not-so-subtle, indicators of exactly where he is, and just who it is that he’s about to tackle. Plaques bearing the gold, red and navy blue Home Office coat of arms adorn the lintels of every doorway, and framed portraits of prime ministers through the ages hang from the walls. There are heavy duty locks and neat, though obvious, surveillance cameras. The furniture is old, the flooring marble, and - bloody hell - even the air reeks of history and influence. There’s something about that mixture of lavender furniture polish, fresh lemon and old cigar smoke that’s designed to make ordinary mortals feel decidedly out of place.

John moves closes to Mary. “It’ll be fine,” he promises her in a murmur. “You’ll see. Fine.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Sherlock has timed himself (ninety-six seconds from Mycroft’s office back to the flat is the perfect length of time to indicate a reluctant, yet furious return) and now he slides his keycard into the lock on the front door, watching with satisfaction as the little LED light turns from red to green. Opening the door, he plants a foot down heavily on the carpet beyond the threshold (it’s where any pressure sensitive pad will be), then steps back again, out into the hallway, letting the door click shut. (The chances are, at the moment, Mycroft will be too preoccupied with getting John out of the building to do more than glance at his automated surveillance systems; when he does, he’ll find the flat door opened and closed, as expected.) Pocketing the card again, Sherlock heads for the stairs (the lift is too easily monitored) and he flies down them, so eagerly that he almost loses contact with the ground entirely as he turns the corner on the first landing.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

The lift deposits John and Mary on Mycroft’s floor more swiftly than John suspects Mary would have liked, and for her, the walk to Mycroft’s office door is obviously far too short because she gulps audibly when their escort knocks on it and Mycroft calls them in. At the sound of Mycroft’s voice, John’s own nerves kick in. Oh, there’s no fear of Mycroft - only still-simmering anger and and the fear of what seeing Mycroft’s face again might make him want to do. He stands taller, straighter and taking a deep breath, opens the door and walks in.

Mycroft is behind his desk, but he rises from his chair immediately. “John. Hello.”

For some horrible reason, John’s heart is suddenly in his throat. He never thought there was much resemblance between Sherlock and Mycroft when Sherlock was alive; now he hears echoes of Sherlock's voice in Mycroft's, sees the same mismatch between hair and skin tones, the same long limbed body, the same easy grace. He blinks, swallows hard.

“Hello, Mycroft.”

Mycroft holds his gaze for a moment - a challenge and a query in his eyes - then he turns to Mary, smiles and extends a hand, “And Sergeant Morstan, I believe. A pleasure.”

At hearing her name on the lips of a man she probably considers second only to God, Mary’s mouth opens and shuts a few times but eventually she manages a stuttered “Sir” and takes his hand. Bastard that he is, Mycroft doesn’t shake it, just turns it over, so that the back is uppermost - as if any moment now he might plant a kiss on it.

The blatant power play brings back all John’s feelings of hostility and contempt. “We’re here to ask you some questions,” he growls.

Mycroft drops Mary’s hand. “I imagined you might be,” he purrs, and turns back towards his chair.

“The report into Sherlock’s death," Johns says briskly. "There are pages missing."

Mycroft freezes mid-step and he pivots slowly round. “ _Are_ there, indeed?” He looks from John to Mary, then back again. “Should I ask if you’re certain about that?”

John stretches his neck, doesn’t flinch. “I’m certain.”

“Then perhaps,” Mycroft muses, making a show of examining his nails,“my question should have been _how_ are you certain. I’m sure your answer would have been most illuminating.”

John glares at him. “I notice you’re not denying it.”

“Then you will also notice that neither am I confirming it.”

John sucks his teeth, works his mouth. “What I’m wondering is why anyone would _want_ to remove them.”

Mycroft treats him to a basilisk stare, one that goes on for so long, John can almost feel himself turning to stone under it.

At last, Mycroft deigns to speak. 

“Take a seat. Both of you.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

By some amazing stroke of luck, Sherlock finds the sixth floor hallway empty. Straightening his jacket, he strides down it. He’ll be in Mycroft’s office before Mycroft can do a damn thing about it. John will be there. His eyes will go wide and his mouth will open, but before he gets a chance to say anything, Sherlock will have seized him by the lapels, dragged him to his feet and kissed him …

(Oh, _hell_.) 

Sherlock’s heated fantasy slams abruptly into the cold, solid wall of reality, and he comes to a squealing halt on the white Carrara flooring mere steps from Mycroft’s door. (Yes, yes, yes - seizing John and kissing him would be easy enough, but with Mycroft there, making disapproving noises? What would happen _next_?) Sherlock lets out a curse, realizing with absolute certainty that he wants his reunion with John to be a private one, where he can say whatever he likes, _do_ whatever he likes. He really should have thought this through more thoroughly.

The snap of a nearby switch puts him instantly on the alert. (There’s someone else here!) He looks around frantically (Is it one of Mycroft’s assistants? Mandy’s replacement?) because he was planning to rethink his attempt at seeing John, not abandon the project entirely. He racks his brains for excuses, for good reasons why he’s not in his room. (’My brother summoned me.’) (’I left some papers in Mycroft’s office.’) (’There’s been a break-in upstairs!') None of them sound particularly convincing, but of the three, he decides that the last is the least feeble, and quickly starts inventing corroborating details - curtains yanked from rails, a vase overturned, a water stain on Mycroft’s lovely carpet, an empty space where the flat-screen TV previously stood - only to find himself face-to-face with not an intimidatingly built security man but a smiling, middle-aged woman in a green overall bearing the logo Isis Cleaning.

“All finished in there now, sir,” she informs him, wheeling a squat, red vacuum cleaner out of Mycroft’s new library. “You can go in now.”

Sherlock acknowledges her with a curt nod, and dives into the room, shutting the door behind him. He’s torn. He knows he can wait a few more days if it means catching John on his own, but on the other hand, after all this time, with John no more than a few feet away, the idea of _not_ seeing him, up close - today - is intolerable.

(But how will John react?) Sherlock presses the palms of his hands together. (John won’t appreciate me appearing out of the blue, with no warning. Not with other people present. Not when he probably wants to be tedious and whine about having been left alone all this time …)

(There must be something … Think! Think!)

Sherlock glances around the room, more out of a desperate lack of ideas, than because he expects inspiration, and yet it comes anyway. Across the room, by the tallest of the bookcases, there’s a library trolley - an old-fashioned, wooden one (like the kind they had at school). (How very Mycroft). It’s waist high, three-tiered, and bears a handful leather-bound volumes and the odd box file. Draped over it, there’s a shabby, brown dust coat. Sherlock pulse quickens.

He shrugs off his jacket, then thinks better of it, and pulls it back on again, before donning the dust coat too. His reflection in the glass door of the bookcase nearest the door tells him the effect is perfect. The coat-and-jacket combination bulks him up, makes him look a stone or more heavier than he really is. He grins. He’d forgotten the fun there is to be had in disguises. Almost enjoying himself now, he hunts around for more things to make himself unrecognizable.

The bookcase shelves are all free of dust but a quick clamber up the sliding ladder reveals that the cleaner has missed the tops of the books on the upper ones. Sherlock takes a tissue from his jacket pocket and delicately skims off the fine grey layer, depositing it on the uppers of his shoes so that instead of looking polished and new, they seem dull and worn. More dust gets flicked over his trouser legs, from the knee down, just below the level of the dust coat. Again, the effect is one of dreary practicality and Sherlock feels his grin widen. His hair, he knows, looks nothing like John remembers it, but what to do about his face? Keeping his chin tucked into his chest and standing at the right angle will keep his annoyingly distinctive lips in shadow, and letting his hair fall forward will keep his eyes hidden, but what about his nose? He looks around the room again. At first, it seems there’s nothing that could be of any use - Sellotape may fool a camera, particularly under a thick layer of make-up, but it’s not going to fool the naked eye; then he spots a fire safety poster affixed to a clear patch of wall. (Where there’s a poster, there’s Blu-Tack!) Pulling the bottom edge of the poster out from the wall, he peels off two putty-like blobs and works them quickly into two small, uneven balls which he stuffs hurriedly into his nose - one up each nostril. They feel ghastly, as if he has the worst head cold ever, but when he checks his reflection in the bookcase glass door again, he can see they've made the base of his nose thicker, almost bulbous. He grabs the book trolley (it’s now or never) (god knows how long the Blu-Tack is going to stay in), trundles it out of the library and up to Mycroft’s door. He doesn’t bother knocking, just turns the handle and walks in.

Mycroft is mid-sentence, delivering some kind of forceful opinion, but whatever he’s saying, Sherlock doesn’t hear it because, after all this time, John - _John_ \- is right in front of him, swivelling around in his seat to see who’s had the gall to burst into Mycroft’s office without permission.

Nothing could ever have prepared Sherlock for the onslaught of emotion that hits him: pain, excitement, want, fear … _heat_. It’s so overwhelming that - absurdly - for a moment, his only clear thought is that when he goes back to work on the Dyer case, he wants to sit in _that_ chair - the chair John's sitting in - not Mycroft’s more comfortable number. Then John’s eyes meet his, and he can’t think at all. 

Sherlock hurriedly ducks his head and lumbers forward with the trolley, doing his very best impression of a man with arthritis-related hip dysplasia. His heart is beating at an insanely fast rate. Any moment now, John’s going to say his name, and Sherlock will be helpless to do anything other than wrap his arms around him.

But John doesn’t speak; Mycroft does.

“What on _earth_ ..?” he hisses, getting to his feet and shooting Sherlock a look of cold fury.

“Them books you wanted, sir,” Sherlock says quickly, adopting a thick Cockney accent (and a thickly adenoidal one at that, thanks to the Blu-Tack). Touching a hand to his forehead, in a gesture that’s not only deferential but also perfect for hiding his face still further, he shunts the trolley forward a few more inches.

Mycroft abandons the safety of his desk and advances on him. “Get _out_ ,” he orders in a dangerously steady voice. “Get. Out. Now.”

However, he looks so thoroughly discomfited that a spark of mischief flares in Sherlock. “You sayin’ you don’t want these books then, after all?” he asks, and gives the trolley another little shove forward.

Quick as a flash, Mycroft stops it with a foot, but the opportunity to run the trolley over Mycroft’s toes - and cause him a little pain - is more than Sherlock can resist. He pushes again, harder. Mycroft gives a little growl of irritation, and pushes back, harder still. And somehow the trolley over-balances. The books spill from its shelves, the box files go flying. One of them lands at John’s feet, and immediately he’s out of his chair, stooping down to gather up the scattered papers and put them back, whilst all Sherlock can do is to stand frozen, mesmerized by the curve of his spine.

“Here,” John says, holding out the file when he’s done.

Sherlock reaches out to take it - slowly, carefully - but their fingers brush anyway and the contact makes him tingle all over. He darts a look at John’s face to see if he felt it too but, to his horror, all he sees there is a sad, compassionate smile. (Sympathy! Sodding _sympathy_!)

Sherlock snatches the file roughly from his hand and turns away, stunned. He collects the rest of the books from the floor, almost snarling at John when he again tries to help, and exits the room without making eye-contact with anyone or saying another word.

(John didn’t recognize me.)

(I didn’t want him to but-)

(Oh god, that woman he was with -) Sherlock's heart lurches unpleasantly. ( - the woman he's _still_ sitting in Mycroft’s office with, isn't some random police sergeant - she's the woman Billy photographed him with on Warwick Way in Pimlico three days ago.)

(Why would John bring her here?) ( _Did_ he bring her here? Perhaps she brought him?) (No, _he_ must have brought _her_ : she's only a sergeant. Mycroft has no time for Other Ranks.)

(So John must have brought her. But why? Why would he want her to meet Mycroft?)

(Oh god - what does it mean? What does it _mean_?)

 

* * * * * * * *

 

As Mary and John walk back to her car, she looks a bit shell-shocked. It’s only when they’re safely away from Whitehall proper and out on Northumberland Avenue that she starts to relax. Her car’s parked a few hundred yards away, and escape close at hand. She pauses beneath one of the lime trees that line that street and, closing her eyes, lets out a long sigh of relief.

“That bad, huh?” John asks, smiling.

She opens her eyes again and fixes him with an accusing look. “You _said_ he wasn’t scary.”

“I said he wasn’t _that_ scary,” John corrects, still smiling. “Still, we got what we went for, right?” He nods towards the manilla file under Mary’s arm.

“Not all of it,” she points out.

“No, well, this is _Mycroft_ we’re dealing with,” John replies. “Not exactly the world’s most accommodating man. But we got the post-mortem report, and a couple of eye-witness statements. Plus I got to watch him squirm a bit, which is always fun.”

But Mary frowns.

“What?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Call it police instinct, but there’s something funny going on here. I just don’t understand why he’d simply hand over the papers like that. There are proper channels to do these things through.”

“I told you: he owes me.”

“I suppose,” Mary nods, though she still doesn’t look completely convinced. Then her face clears and she smiles. “Listen, are you free on Friday evening? D’you fancy going out somewhere? For a drink? I’ll have had time to read through everything by then, and it would be good to be able to talk it through with someone.” She hesitates. “Although you’re probably busy ...”

John hesitates too - he doesn’t want to give her the wrong idea - but then he remember what it was like being back in London again and all alone after Afghanistan, how desperate he was for a bit of company.

“Friday would be great,” he says firmly. “What about the Warwick again? Although it'll have to be early because I'm doing two twelve-hours shifts this weekend. Half-six any good for you?”

She smiles warmly. “I’ll look forward to it.”


	3. Cardiac Arrest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mary uncovers some disturbing evidence from the report into Sherlock's death, and a nasty turn of events has Sherlock hurrying to search 221B for vital clues ... right at the very time John is there on an errand of his own.

**_Wednesday, April 10th - evening_ **

 

 

Sherlock is _no_ t in a good mood. The inside of his nose is sore and, even though he removed the bits of Blu-Tack hours ago, he can still half-smell, half-taste the stuff. But that’s the least of the things setting his nerves on edge right now: being cooped up in Mycroft’s flat would be enough to drive him crazy all on its own, and Mycroft’s sanctimonious reply to his last desperate text to send out for cigarettes might have driven a less rational man to fratricide. Meanwhile, on top of all that, there’s the Dyer case: all frustrating possibilities and no access to concrete evidence. It’s really no wonder he feels like destroying things.

He paces the living room, looking for promising breakables, and his gaze falls upon a (purely bloody ornamental, apparently) black crystal ashtray. The thing is certainly heavy enough, but it’s _so_ solid and rounded, and so obviously high quality, there’s not a hope in hell of it shattering. Ditto the walnut coffee table, which would probably only succumb to a sizeable quantity of high explosives. Kicking it over might be satisfying for moment or two, but hardly worth the inevitable broken toes. In desperation, Sherlock snatches up one of Mycroft’s tasteful linen scatter cushions and hurls it at a wall but it does nothing more impressive that expel a contemptuous little puff of air before tumbling softly to the floor.

(I’ll kill her.) The thought rises unbidden in Sherlock’s mind as he surveys the depressing lack of damage. He quickly amends it. (No. I’ll kill _him_.) (He was supposed to have _waited_ , damn him!)

And there it is. The real reason he can’t settle. This awful sense of dread that he came back too late. That he made John wait too long. He ought to have ignored Mycroft’s dire warnings about the threat Moriarty’s criminal network posed to his own life and to John’s, and kept in contact with him anyway.

He should go to John. Now. Right now.

But as he turns towards the bedroom to fetch his coat, a single rap on the front door, followed by the sound of it opening, stop him.

Mycroft walks in, uninvited, and looking less than pleased. His eyes have narrowed to slits and a muscle to one side of his nose is twitching unpleasantly. (He’s furious, though trying not to let it show.) “I thought,” he says slowly, delivering each word as if it were a slap to the face, “that you and I had an agreement.”

Sherlock ignores the appeal to his sense of fair play: he doesn’t have one. (And Mycroft knows that - because neither does he, merely an awareness that other - lesser - people do.) “Who was that woman?” he demands. “The one in your office?”

Mycroft does a double-take - almost as if he wasn’t expecting the question (because he’s such a practised liar that faking involuntary reactions comes naturally to him). Even so, he can’t quite suppress the beginnings of a smirk as he tries to feign complete incomprehension. “Woman?”

“Oh, don’t try that,” Sherlock snarls. “The woman with John. The policewoman woman. Why was she there? What did she want? And - more to the point - why was John with her?”

For a moment, Mycroft seems on the brink of saying something; then he appears to think better of it, and some of the tension leaves his face. He examines a perfectly manicured fingernail. “I thought you might have deduced it by now. Are you sure you want to know?”

“Yes!” Sherlock cries, although all of a sudden, he isn’t. (Mycroft is looking positively _relieved_.) “Tell me.”

Mycroft gives him a sad smile. “You won’t like it.”

Asking again would be redundant (you don’t need to be a genius to interpret a clue like that) but Sherlock has to, because parts of his mind are already rebelling, refusing to accept the obvious, and his head is filling up with competing voices, each one shouting louder than the last … (He loves you!) (Yes, but you pissed off, didn’t you? And John has needs; he’s driven by them.) (But he’s decent, honourable - he _wouldn’t_ betray you!) (You didn’t consult him, though, did you? You took a unilateral decision and _left_ him.) (He said sex with you was the best he’d ever had.) (But you never told him how much you needed him.) (No, it’s all right. Don’t be stupid: he loves you! He’s always loved you.) (But you hurt his feelings, his pride.) (You break things, you always have.) (You’re selfish and insensitive and-)

Sherlock finds himself gripping a chair back for support. “Tell me.”

Mycroft’s mouth twists and his nose wrinkles (in an elaborate show of reluctance to speak) (but he says it anyway). “John is rather old-fashioned, isn’t he? Principled. Believes there’s a right way of going about things. He didn’t want me to find out from anyone else. Wanted to tell me himself … I’m sorry, Sherlock. I really am.”

The voices in Sherlock’s head fall silent. Even the traffic out in the street stops making any noise, and the muted colours in Mycroft’s flat become paler still - bleached and barren. Sherlock has the strangest feeling of being up high somewhere, removed from everything and everyone - completely alone, the only sound in the whole world that of the blood rushing in his ears.

(This is why Mycroft didn’t want me to see him: he’s been trying to protect me … from _this_. This terrible, aching sense of iso-)

“Sherlock? Are you all right?”

Sherlock blinks, and the whiteness surrounding him shifts back into subtle tones of cream and grey and fawn. He straightens his jacket, tosses his head: if there’s one thing he can’t bear, it’s pity. “What? Yes. Fine. I’m fine.”

But Mycroft is frowning. “You don’t look fine. Would you like a drink? There’s some brandy in the cabinet over there - a rather nice Armagnac, in fact.”

“Oh, for god’s sake, Mycroft! There is nothing wrong with me - d’you understand? Nothing! I’m all right.”

Mycroft hovers uncertainly. “Are you sure you don’t want anything?”

(Space, Mycroft - I want space.) (And time.) ( And quiet.) (I want to run away and hide, somewhere private, where I can scream and rant, and lick my wounds. Like I always used to.)

Sherlock swallows down the lump that's rising in his throat and gives Mycroft a determinedly steely look. “What I want, Mycroft - what I _need_ \- is to get back to work.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

John finally gets off work just before midnight, the urgent treatment of an elderly, homeless man with Acute Chest Syndrome having extended his shift by almost two hours. He gets a taxi home, glad he doesn’t have an early start in the morning. It’s been a long day and he’s tired - but he knows getting to sleep isn’t going to be easy. Not with the morning’s meeting with Mycroft still buzzing around his brain. There was something odd in Mycroft’s manner - even odder than usual. Particularly after that funny old librarian walked in ...

Wandering into the kitchen, John thinks about making tea or coffee, but opts for hot milk instead, then sits in the armchair in front of the blank TV screen to drink it, wondering how Mary’s getting on with the paperwork Mycroft eventually handed over. Half of him wishes he’d taken it himself but the other half is glad he didn’t have to, that Mary was happy to go through it herself: the details of how Sherlock died are vivid enough already, without having to read about them.

Besides, what good would reading Mycroft’s papers do? Whatever they say, they’re not going to bring Sherlock back.

John drains his mug, rinses it out in the sink and goes to bed.

 

* * * * * *

 

**_Thursday, April 11th_ **

 

 

The Dyer case makes no sense. There’s been a ransom demand, but Sherlock can’t shake the belief that Dyer left Television Centre of his own accord. (Why would a man walk willingly into captivity? Only an idiot would do that.) (Then again, most people _are_ idiots.) The ever-growing pile of paperwork in front of Sherlock now includes statements from friends and neighbours, bank statements, forensics data from Dyer's country house, and background information like putative film and television contracts covering the next three years, as well as the original police report, and he stares at it resentfully, trying to will it into piecing itself together into some kind of pattern. (There must _be_ a pattern. There's _always_ a pattern.)

It’s at times like this Sherlock misses his skull: it would always listen patiently as he rattled off theories, and he’s always been able to think better when he talks out loud. (You can hear the flaws in an argument once it’s outside your head. Until you put it into words and sentences, it’s a ball of unshaped potential, neither wrong nor right - invulnerable - but said out loud, it becomes a _thing_. It needs consistency, cohesion. The parts have to work together, or at the first hint of criticism, it will fall apart.) (Not that the skull ever criticized: there are certain things only a person can do.)

(Particularly if that person has an extraordinary ability to inspire genius.) (If that person is a conductor of light.)

Sherlock drops his head into his hands, and closes his eyes, the bitter-sweet memory of calling John that to his face suddenly vivid. He remembers the graveyard, the grey stone and the damp grass; the feel of cold iron under his hand as he pushed open the gate; his stomach tightening with the fear of rejection as he approached John, his heart fluttering with hope. He remembers too John’s modest dismissal of descriptors like ‘amazing’ and ‘fantastic’, and his good-tempered reaction to being reminded that he wasn’t a genius himself. Anyone but John would have seen that as Sherlock compounding his twin crimes of shouting at him, and of implying that they weren’t even friends; John took it all in his stride. And that night, he kissed Sherlock like he wanted to devour him, all Sherlock’s sins forgiven and forgotten.

(A man like that - a man who loves like that - wouldn’t be petty enough to go off with someone else just because he’d been excluded from the initial stages of formulating of a plan.)

Inside Sherlock's head, unspoken and untested, the theory sounds reasonable enough. In fact, he’s almost sure of it. He nods to himself, and goes back to work a little more cheerfully.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

John walks into Fiona Finnan’s office with an undeniable feeling of dread. She was perfectly friendly when she stopped him in the corridor to invite him to her office for ‘a little chat’, but she’s the Senior Hospital Manager and in the twenty minutes that have elapsed since, John has had time to torture himself thinking about each and every case that didn’t go exactly as he’d hoped since he first started working here, and now he’s convinced he’s going to be hauled over the coals for something or - worse still - sacked. Sometimes it seems as if this job is all that’s holding him together and he doesn’t know how he’d cope if he lost it.

“Close the door, please, and come and take a seat,” Finnan says.

John does as he’s told.

“I’ve been looking at your CV,” Finnan says, once he’s settled himself

“Uh, have you?” John asks, with what he hopes is a winning, boyish smile. “Is there, um, a problem?”

Finnan looks at him reproachfully over the top of her reading glasses. “You’ve been holding back on me, Doctor Watson,” she chides. “All these skills-” She taps the sheet of white A4 paper in front of her. “-that you’ve never told me about.”

Unsure whether she considers that a good thing or a bad one, John struggles to find a reply. “I- uh-”

“But you don’t seem to have published anything,” Finnan goes on. “Not since medical school, anyway.”

Oh bugger. It’s true. And John knows he should have. At some point. It’s expected. It’s just that in Afghanistan, there wasn’t time, and when he came back to London, and had to live in that dingy little bedsit, he hardly had the motivation to get out of bed, let alone work up any enthusiasm for research. Then, suddenly, there was Sherlock, and nothing else mattered.

“No,” John mumbles, “I haven’t.”

“Would you like to? Because I see from this that you have quite a lot of experience in cardiovascular problems, and it just so happens Anthony Alsopp’s research team needs a fifth contributor.”

Anthony Alsopp. John’s heard the name. Their paths have never crossed but the man is a legend at Guy’s and St Thomas'. Famously brilliant. Notoriously bad-tempered.

John clears his throat. “I - yes, thanks. But I don’t think I’m really qualified. I’m not a specialist. There must be half a dozen people here who’d be better suited for the job.”

“Nonsense,” Finnan says firmly, and quickly types out a few words on her computer keyboard. “You have something the team desperately needs: people skills. The project involves working with the public as part of the hospital’s outreach programme. It needs someone sympathetic, someone patients would be willing to open up to. It’ll mean longer hours, of course, and quite a bit of travelling around London, interviewing pre- and post-operative patients, but from what your colleagues tell me, you’re not a man who’s afraid of hard work, are you?”

Longer hours. More work. Less free time. John shakes his head eagerly. “No.”

“Good, that’s settled then,” Finnan says. She hits Return with her little finger and slips John’s CV back into a folder. “But I should warn you - Professor Alsopp can be a very difficult man to work for. Do you see that as being a problem?”

John gives her a wry smile. “No. Not at all. He wouldn’t be the first difficult man I’ve worked with.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Friday, April 12th_ **

 

 

Sherlock awakes, vaguely surprised to find himself in bed: his last clear memory is of being at Mycroft’s desk, although now he’s started thinking about it, somewhere at the back of his mind there’s a fuzzy recollection of coming to in the middle of the night, with a newspaper cutting stuck to his cheek, followed by an even fuzzier memory of stumbling out of Mycroft’s office and into the lift.

He’s not fuzzy now. In fact, his mind is razor-sharp again, buzzing with new insight. He sees now he's been unutterably stupid to have spent the past two days oscillating wildly between certainty that John would never in a million years go off with someone else (let alone someone as unexciting as a _policewoman_ ) and being equally convinced that he absolutely _would_. He should have realized allowing himself to fall prey to his emotions would leave him unable to observe what was right under his nose. (Never used to have _emotions_ before John.) (Well, not ones that asserted themselves quite so shamelessly, anyway.)

He jumps out of bed, showers quickly and dresses, his mind whirring. He’s been so wrapped up in his own feelings about John, That Woman and What It All Means, that he barely registered _Mycroft’s_. This morning, however, things are different, and he replays the scene in Mycroft’s office, focusing on Mycroft this time, not John.

Mycroft was behind his desk - standing, not sitting. (A defensive stance - but one implying a readiness to go on the attack.) He was speaking, his voice perfectly even - but the spaces between his words were a beat too long and he was leaning forward slightly, one hand on the desktop. (A subtle attempt at intimidation.)

(Dear God - Mycroft was feeling _threatened_.)

Sherlock presses his hands together, and bounces the edge of his forefingers against his lips, using the rhythmic motion to help him concentrate as he briefly considers the possibility that Mycroft might be in trouble with the police. He discards the notion almost instantly. (Mycroft practically _is_ the police.) (Which means that, if he was feeling threatened by anyone, it was by John.) ( _John_?) (Why - _how_ \- could Mycroft feel threatened by John? John’s not violent, or dangerous, or someone who’d resort to blackmail.) (Besides, Mycroft is far too dull to be vulnerable to extortion …)

(What the hell is going on?) (How could John be any kind of challenge to Mycroft’s perfectly ordered world?) (What does Mycroft have or want that John could possibly take from him?)

Sherlock’s body supplies an answer before his brain gets the chance, flushing with heat and pleasure as realization dawns. (That Woman isn’t John’s girlfriend, whatever Mycroft says.) (Not one that matters, anyway.)

For a moment, it all seems very simple (Mycroft wants to keep me away from John) but then it doesn’t. (Why?) For all he’s annoying and interfering, Sherlock knows Mycroft cares about him, and has always wanted the best for him: who was it that pushed him into John’s arms in the first place? Sherlock sits down on the bed and, leaning forward, scratches at the back of his head with both hands. (Think! Think!)

Unfortunately, thinking doesn’t help, and eventually he abandons the effort (Mycroft is so generally strange, the answer may well be something unfathomable), in favour of something far more important: coming up with a plan for getting to see John again. (Alone.) (And preferably somewhere he can be swiftly rendered naked …)

The trouble is, seeing John means leaving the flat, then the building … (Not something to which Mycroft will readily agree just now.) (Unless …) 

A plan starts to take shape in Sherlock’s head. He takes his phone from his pocket and rings Mycroft’s number.

“Rather busy at the moment,” Mycroft replies smoothly, although there’s a crisp edge of irritation to his tone. “Go away.”

“Really? What with? Affairs of state? The PM there, is he? The Queen?”

“You know I can’t tell you that. _Go. Away._ ”

(Ooh! At least _one_ of them, then.) (Which means Mycroft won’t be able to argue for long.) Sherlock grins and presses home his advantage. “I need to go out, Mycroft.”

“No!” Sherlock hears Mycroft swallow, then cough, before muttering, “My apologies, Sir. A little … domestic matter … If I could just ..?” In the background, a very recognizable Old Etonian voice urges Mycroft to make it quick, and when Mycroft speaks again, it’s in a hushed, impatient whisper. “Sherlock Holmes, you will stay where you are.”

“I thought you wanted me to solve the Dyer case? Or isn’t it very important? You know, Mycroft, I’m beginning to suspect-”

“All right, all right!” Mycroft’s voice is momentarily louder than he expected, apparently because he quickly drops it again. “Where? _Where_ do you need to go?”

“Television Centre, of course,” Sherlock replies blithely, beginning to enjoy himself. “And very probably Dyer’s country estate as well. Need to see them for myself. I can go in disguise, if you’re worried about my safety. If I can fool John Watson, I can fool anyone, as I’m sure you’ll agree.”

There’s a faint sound of tooth enamel grinding against tooth enamel, followed by a heavy sigh. “All right. But I’m sending someone with you. To be on the safe side.”

It takes Sherlock several seconds before he’s sure there’ll be no hint of a triumphant smile in his voice when he replies, with just the right amount of sulky resentment to make it sound convincing, “I don’t need a bodyguard, Mycroft!”

Mycroft gives a little growl of exasperation. “Indulge me.”

Sherlock sighs dramatically. “All right. Fine. I’ll take one of your minders - just don’t lumber with me anyone stupid.”

 

* * * * * * *

 

Baked beans, four-pack: £2.50

_Beep!_

Wholemeal bread, large: £1.30

_Beep!_

Tea bags, box of eighty: £2.55

_Beep!_

Semi-skimmed milk, 4 pints/2.27 litres: £1.82

_Beep!_

His shopping done and not a single complaint about unknown items in the bagging area, John hits the Finish and Pay button and pushes his credit card into the reader. A minute later, the thing is spitting out money-off vouchers, and receipts, and thanking him for shopping at Sainsburys. He gathers up his orange plastic bags and exits the shop, unscolded by electronic voices, his dignity intact.

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

Having gained access to Television Centre by the simple expedient of flashing yet another of Lestrade’s confiscated ID cards at the doorman (a trick that never fails!), Sherlock is feeling rather pleased with himself: not only has he circumvented some of the tightest security in London (it’s been notoriously stringent for years - long before Julian Dyer went missing) (so many celebrities, so many opportunities for crazed fans, thieves, tabloid journalists and terrorists), but he’s also managed to lose Mandy Mark II - last seen trying to fight his way out of the mob of prepubescent girls mobbing the latest collection of talentless narcissists to call itself a boy band.

Now Sherlock is striding down corridors which smell faintly of paint and new carpets (it looks like _The Sun_ ’s complaints about ‘another unnecessary facelift at the Beeb’ weren’t entirely without foundation), heading for the rear exit (all those hours at Mycroft’s desk poring over White City schematics have paid off). Sherlock knows he doesn’t have much time: it won’t be long before Mandy Mark II gives up trying to catch up with him himself and calls Mycroft for help. Before that happens, Sherlock is determined to be on the Jubilee Line, heading east. (The whole point of this excursion is to get to John, after all.) (Guy’s and St Thomas’ first. If he’s not there, on to East Dulwich.) Sherlock pats his jacket pocket to reassure himself his phone is still there, only to remember he got rid of it in Montpellier. It doesn't matter. He doesn't need Billy’s text to know where John lives now: he’s learnt the address by heart. Catching John at the hospital would be best (it’s closer, and therefore more achievable before Mycroft puts out some kind of APB) but, to be honest, Sherlock would prefer surprising John at home. The more he thinks about seeing him again, the more eager he is to be at liberty to shove him up against a wall, or bend him over the back of a chair, and remind him exactly where his best interests lie.

A warm throb of arousal has just started making its way around the lower regions of Sherlock’s pelvis when he notices that the portly, fifty-something walking towards him is casting him an extremely suspicious look. As the man draws closer, his brow furrows, and - eyes flicking from Sherlock’s face to his chest (damn! he’s looking for a name badge) - he comes to an abrupt halt in front of him, blocking Sherlock’s path.

“Are you lost?” the man challenges.

Sherlock could lie, claim he is, laugh apologetically and head back the way he’s come, but he’s too pressed for time. Instead, he opts for a bit of camaraderie. “God, I hope not,” he says, pulling an anxious face (inviting sympathy). “Mind you, if I don’t get back to my office and look busy, I might well be. Only got hired a fortnight ago. And now I hear the Director General’s _here_ \- actually in the building - doing the rounds to check up on productivity, apparently. Janet from Accounts - d’you know Janet? - reckons that, what with the government cutting funding _again_ , the board has decided to look for more savings and trim back fat. You know - all that _Daily Mail_ -pleasing stuff. You haven’t heard anything, have you?”

The other man’s loose grey cheeks pale a little. “No.”

Sherlock gives a breathy little laugh, as if greatly relieved. “Maybe Janet’s got it wrong, then, and there's nothing to worry about. Fancy a coffee? There are a few things-”

“No. Sorry.” Clearly exceedingly rattled, the other man shakes his head. “I need to … I’m busy …” And with that, he scuttles away, leaving the corridor empty again.

(Success!)

Sherlock takes a right, then a left, and suddenly the glass cubicle of a porter’s lodge and two big glass and steel doors come into sight. Beyond them, sunlight beckons. (The exit!)

Sherlock quickens his pace, waves Lestrade’s ID under the porter’s nose and escapes out through the doors. However, he scarcely has time to heave a sigh of relief when a small, somewhat familiar woman, in horn-rimmed glasses and a dark trouser suit approaches him.

(Oh, _wonderful_. It’s Bentley.)

“Good morning, Mr Holmes,” she says. “Mr Holmes Senior said you’d probably leave the building by the back door.”

Sherlock glares at her. “What are _you_ doing here?”

“Your brother sent me, sir,” she replies calmly, adding with a nod towards a sleek black car parked on double yellow lines just beyond the gate, “to collect you.”

“Piss off,” Sherlock snaps. “I don’t need collecting!”

Bentley is unmoved. “Please accompany me to the car, sir.”

“And if I say no? What are you going to do about it? Force me?”

She looks him coolly up and down. “How tall are you, sir? Six foot? Six foot one? You fence, box and have a black belt in baritsu. I’m five foot three and have trouble opening pickle jars. I can’t _force_ you to do anything.”

“What then? Another of Mycroft’s drug cocktails? 

Bentley shakes her head. The movement makes her glasses jiggle a little, as if they might fall off at any minute. (They’re too wide for her face.) (And with a prescription that high, she really ought to have better fitting ones: she’d be blind as a bat without them.) “You’re free to come with me or not, as you see fit,” she says. “But I hope you will. I’m afraid there’s been a serious incident, and your brother is concerned for your safety.”

Sherlock snorts, unconvinced. (This is another of Mycroft’s tricks.) “What kind of ‘serious incident’?”

“A Mrs Hudson, sir. She’s been shot.”

Sherlock goes cold all over ( _Three bullets. Three gunmen. Three victims._ ) and he stares at Bentley, aghast, fighting a sudden wave of panicked nausea. (Mycroft was right. I should have stayed in France, I should have stayed in France - because if they’ve got Mrs Hudson …)

“Who else?” he asks, his throat tight with fear. “Who else have they shot?”

Bentley shrugs apologetically. “I’m sorry, sir: you’ll have to ask your brother.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Mary sets her knife and fork down on her plate, a little smear of gravy and a single crumb of flaky pastry all that's left of her steak and ale pie. The fly that’s been buzzing around the room all evening seizes the opportunity to try swooping down down onto the plate, but she bats it away, then re-opens the menu up, asking with a guilty smile, “Pudding?”

John smiles back. It’s nice to have dinner with someone who enjoys eating: Sherlock never did - which meant John couldn’t really savour his food when they ate out together; he mostly ended up wolfing it down, whilst all Sherlock did was poke half-heartedly at whatever John had cajoled him into ordering. Food was just fuel to Sherlock. Apart from work, the only thing he ever seemed to have any hunger for was sex. John stomach flips over as a particularly filthy memory surfaces: he’d sneaked off to his room to indulge in a chocolate éclair, when suddenly the door flew open and Sherlock strode in with _that look_ in his eyes. The next thing John knew, the éclair was in the wastepaper bin and his chocolate-sticky fingertips were in Sherlock’s mouth, being licked slowly clean, whilst Sherlock made short work of unzipping his flies. After that, there was a lot more licking - of the spine-meltingly intimate kind - and all John could do was squirm, and clutch at Sherlock’s hair, and beg him to get the hell on with it and just _fuck_ him.

Heat floods John’s cheeks even as sadness stabs at his heart: none of that will ever happen again. He shakes his head. “Better not.” He pats his waistline by way of explanation but the truth is, he’s lost his appetite now.

Mary nods. “No, you’re right. Besides, we ought to be getting down to business.”

Business. Yes. The papers they got from Mycroft. As one of the waitresses clears their table, Mary takes the manilla folder from her bag and sets it in front of John. It’s thicker than when he saw it last, and he guesses Mary must have added information the Met has on file. His heart sinks. He doesn’t think he can read any of it. Not now. Maybe not ever. “Thanks,” he says, uncertainly.

“I made notes,” Mary tells him. “On post-its. It makes interesting reading.”

That’s exactly what John was afraid of. “Does it?”

Mary looks around the dining room annex. It’s busy, every last one of the red leather sofas occupied, with more people squeezed in on stools, or propped up against the walls as they wait for tables. She inches closer and drops her voice. “Well, to start with, those eye-witness accounts? I checked out the names and addresses. They’re fake, all of them.”

John blinks at her. “But there were people there. _Real_ people. I saw them. They -” He stops. Swallows. “ - they pulled me away from him … Doctors. Nurses.”

“The names on those accounts don’t tally with anyone working at Barts at the time,” Mary insists. “So either the doctors and nurses you saw lied about their names and addresses, or their statements weren’t included in the official file. I’m telling you, John - all the names in there are fake.”

A wave of nausea washes over John. He gulps down some water. “But surely someone would have noticed that? Lestrade? Donovan? The coroner?”

Mary nods. “Someone, definitely. They’ve all been signed off on. There’s an official stamp, the incident number - everything, but when I ran the number through the computer, it just came up ‘Classified’.”

John clenches his jaw. “Mycroft.”

“It looks like it.”

“But why?” John asks.

“I think perhaps he was trying to prevent more scandal.”

“ _More_ scandal?”

Mary bites her lip. “I’m sorry, John, but I have to ask - was Sherlock on drugs?”

“What? No!” John gasps, but even as he denies it, he can’t help remembering Lestrade's so-called ‘drug bust’ and Sherloc's urgent 'You might want to shut up' - and suddenly he’s not sure. _No_ , he tells himself firmly: he’s a _doctor_ ; he’d have noticed.

“I’m not talking about your standard recreational drugs,” Mary goes on. “Nothing illegal. But other stuff? Weird stuff?”

John grimaces. On that front, he really couldn’t say for certain. Sherlock was always tinkering about with something, testing, experimenting - and not just on himself, the arrogant, entitled dick. “Why?”

Mary runs a pensive finger down through the condensation that’s formed on the outside of her as yet barely sipped pint of lager. “The post mortem … it found something.”

“Such as?”

“Rhododendron ponticum.”

The words stir something in John’s brain. He’s heard them before. Heard them on Sherlock’s lips. Oh god. It was in the lab at Barts, he was investigating the disappearance of those kids, right before- Oh god, oh god, oh god.

“It causes low blood pressure,” Mary goes on, although John already knows that. He has some expertise in toxins, particularly grayanotoxins. “And slows the heart down. It can cause dizziness, fainting and, in some cases-”

“Death,” John supplies. Dear god, Sherlock really wanted to be sure, didn’t he? Poison _and_ a sixty-foot plummet? A bubble of hysterical laughter rises in John: typical Sherlock - he never did do anything by halves.

“Yes,” Mary nods. “Although … there was something else …” Her eyes dart about John’s face, gauging his reaction. She seems to be weighing up whether he’ll be able to bear what she’s going to say next.

“Tell me,” he says hoarsely, because he doesn’t think it could possibly hurt any more than it already does.

“I got forensics to run some more tests on some of the clothing samples taken from the body-”

John can’t suppress a shudder at the word - Sherlock’s beautiful body, just lying there, broken - and he’s so lost in his sadness that he almost doesn’t hear what Mary says next.

“The blood, John. It wasn’t right.”

John’s head snaps up, clear again, and something awfully like hope takes flight in his chest - because although he’s since dismissed his reaction as one of horror, grief, and denial, he remembers thinking exactly that at the time. The colour. The consistency. “What d’you mean? It wasn’t Sherlock’s?”

“No, it was _his_ ,” Mary answers. “But it had been frozen.”

It’s as if the world stops turning. John stares at Mary, not even uncomprehending, because her words seem stuck, half-way between his eardrum and his brain. Even so, they feel dangerous, as if at any moment, if he tries to process them, they’ll explode like grenades in his head.

He watches as Mary’s eyes open and close infinitely slowly, feeling the thud of a single heartbeat reverberating through his chest. To Mary’s right, the fly that was annoying them earlier hangs motionless in the air, defying gravity … Then Mary speaks again, and everything starts running too fast. The fly zips past, buzzing noisily; John’s pulse becomes frantic, and Mary leans in closer still.

“There were traces of cryoprotectants in the sample,” she says. “Glycerol, dimethyl sulphoxide …”

“Yes,” John agrees. He knows: it’s standard practice, to prevent intra- and extracellular damage. What he doesn’t know is why or how or when. The room seems to be spinning.

Mary offers him a little smile. “Actually, it was your blog that gave me the idea - your notes on The Great Game case.” She pauses, a little crease of worry appearing between her brows. “John? Are you all right?”

The room isn’t the only thing spinning. John’s head is too. If that pool of blood on the pavement, on Sherlock’s head, had been frozen, then perhaps he wasn’t bleeding? Perhaps … _No_. However much John wants to believe the opposite, he _knows_ Sherlock died. He _saw_ it happen. Felt his pulse. Felt _nothing_ …

“I- Yes. No. I … I’m sorry. I need to go.”

“I’ll give you a lift,” Mary tells him, reaching for her bag. “Let me settle up and-”

“No.” John pulls out his wallet, hands her a couple of twenties. “I’ll pay. And - thanks - but I’ll walk. I need the air.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Friday, April 12th_ **

 

 

By 10 pm Sherlock is practically climbing the walls with frustration and dread: he's been stuck here - useless - for almost nine hours now, and his frantic texts to Billy for information on John’s whereabouts have all gone unanswered. Meanwhile, Mycroft has disappeared, although he’s obviously instructed his security guards to be hypervigilant: Sherlock can scarcely go to the toilet without an escort. He’s trapped between Mycroft’s office and his flat, unable to do anything other than wait, and drive himself insane with the thought that John may already be dead.

Through the partly open window (it will open so far, and no further) (Mycroft’s never been keen on fresh air), comes the sound of Big Ben tolling the hour and the damn thing sounds so mournful, so _ominous_ , that Sherlock shivers. He’s just yanking the window closed again to shut it out when Mycroft finally decides to show his face.

“Who else?” Sherlock demands, before Mycroft’s even noticed him standing there. “Mrs Hudson and who else?”

Mycroft’s brows draw together, but it’s a confused frown, not a grim one, and the iron-tight band around Sherlock’s chest loosens a little. He sinks into a chair (the plain Windsor one that _John_ occupied two days ago), his nervous energy suddenly spent.

“No-one else,” Mycroft says, as comprehension dawns. He closes the door and sets his briefcase down on the floor. “Mrs Hudson was hit in the upper part of her left arm. A flesh wound, no more. She’s fine. Last seen taking tea and biscuits in Ward 8 of the Heart Hospital on Westmoreland Street.”

Sherlock nods, relieved. “But?”

“But?” Mycroft gives a bright little laugh. “But nothing. She’s expected to make a full recovery.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. “Oh, come on, Mycroft. You’ve been missing all day. _Something’s_ going on.”

Mycroft crosses to the sideboard and rubs at some tiny imperfection he discovers there. “I had … things to do. Affairs of state.” He looks back at Sherlock and smiles. “The usual. Nothing for you to concern yourself with.”

“I’m concerned about my _friends_ ,” Sherlock growls, ignoring Mycroft’s blink of surprise at his use of the term. “About Mrs Hudson. And Lestrade. And John. He threatened all of three of them. Today, it was Mrs Hudson. Tomorrow it might be …” He swallows. “Tell me what happened, Mycroft.”

Mycroft hesitates, then shrugs. “Mrs Hudson has been doing me a little favour …”

“What kind of favour?”

“Oh, nothing dangerous. A little light housekeeping, nothing more. I thought … Well, I thought you’d want to return to 221B. Eventually. So I’ve been paying her a retainer, plus a little extra to keep the place clean and collect your post - that sort of thing - so that, when the time was right, you could move back in without a lot of fuss.”

Sherlock stares at his brother, astonished, awkward feelings he’s not used to - affection and appreciation - spreading warmly through his chest. He clears his throat. “Um, yes. Thank you.” A moment later, the warmth turns to chilly realization. “Dear god. Mrs Hudson was in 221B, wasn't she? When it happened.”

Mycroft nods. “Perhaps now you can understand my reluctance to let you leave the building.”

“Did someone break in?” Sherlock asks, swearing a silent oath to kill whoever did this. Slowly. Painfully. And with imagination.

“Apparently not. The shot was fired from outside, right through the open living room window. The bullet didn’t even graze the paintwork.”

“From outside?” Sherlock echoes. “Through the window? That’s a crack shot.”

“Yes. Our best guess is someone with military training. Someone who’s seen action.”

Sherlock feels his eyes go wide, but Mycroft merely laughs.

“Relax, Sherlock: John Watson is not the only ex-serviceman in London.”

Feeling stupid, Sherlock forces a laugh too. (Of course it wasn’t John. I didn’t seriously think that it was.) (Except … He didn’t know me. He’s dating _a woman_ instead of waiting for me to come home … Perhaps he’s changed? Perhaps he’s gone mad?)

“Mr Chatterjee said he heard a gunshot and ran out into the street but there was no obvious sign of a gunman, so he called the police.”

Sherlock gives a grunt of acknowledgement, but there’s something about this story that doesn’t sit right. He goes over to the window again and fingers the latch thoughtfully. Then it comes to him. He spins around. “What does it tell you when an assassin fails to kill, Mycroft?”

Mycroft nods grimly. “It tells you that he wasn’t really trying. Mrs Hudson isn’t his target, Sherlock; you are.”

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

**_Saturday, April 13th - 2.25pm_ **

 

 

On any other day, John would be finishing a shift like the one he’s just put in with a quiet glow of satisfaction. He’s diagnosed and successfully treated: one case of peritonitis; one obstructed bowel; three myocardial infarctions. He’s repaired two broken bones and one stab wound, put three patients on drips awaiting further tests, and sent a roofer with spinal disc herniation up to orthopaedics for specialist surgery. He even managed to make a couple of terrified little kids waiting in triage laugh by playing peekaboo around a pillar and pulling silly faces at them - and it’s still only half-past two.

But this isn’t any other day; it’s the day after Mary told him the blood on the pavement outside Barts had been frozen, and he’s too agitated to be proud of his performance. He can only think that he needs answers, needs to ask more questions … if only he could think what they should be.

“That you off?” Jack Hughes asks, exiting the locker room just as John is entering it. “Lucky beggar.”

“Yeah,” John mutters, shedding his white coat. “That’s me - ‘lucky’.”

“Hey,” Jack says gently, stopping him with a hand on his arm. “You okay, mate?”

John sucks in a breath, nods. “Just a bit tired.”

Jack holds his gaze for a moment, making John fear further probing, but in the end, Jack just pats his arm. “Yeah. Not the easiest job in the world, is it?”

“No,” John agrees. But it’s not the hardest either. Not for him, anyway. He folds his coat, puts it away in his locker, and takes out his phone, wondering whether to call Mary. If they could meet up, if she could lend him the files-

He stops. He’s had a text from Molly. 

_Text: Call me. Urgent. Mx._

John rings immediately.

“John! Yes. Hello.” Molly’s tone leaps wildly from warmth, to seriousness, to brisk, forced calm. “Thanks for calling back. Listen, she’s okay, so don’t worry-”

John’s stomach drops. “Mary? Is she in trouble?” If she is, it’s all his fault. He's the one who encouraged her to go poking around in police files she probably had no authorization to look at. He’s the one who took her to see Mycroft. Dear god, what was he thinking?

There’s a moment’s silence, then, “Mary? Why would you … Oh! No, not Mary. Mrs Hudson. She’s in hospital, but she’s all right. She’s just been a bit … shot.”

“Jesus!” John cries and one of the new interns, changing into his scrubs, glances over, alerted by the horror in John’s voice. John quickly lowers it to a whisper. “Mrs Hudson? Molly, what are you talking about? What does ‘a bit shot’ mean?”

“In her arm. Yesterday. She’s okay - just a nasty cut - but it sent her BP soaring. They’re keeping her in for observation. I thought you’d want to know?”

“Yes. Thanks,” John replies, more than a little bewildered. The world just keeps throwing weirdness at him. “Um, where is she? I’d like to see her.”

“I knew you would,” Molly says, and John can hear warm approval in her tone. “She’s at the Heart Hospital. Visiting hours are two ‘til eight.”

John ends the call with more thanks and a good-bye, then, steeling himself for a journey that will inevitably take him far too close to Baker Street for comfort, he rings for a taxi.

 

* * * * * * * * * *

 

**_2.50 pm_ **

 

 

Clarity is a beautiful thing, Sherlock has always thought - and a rare one. It’s something he’s striven for all his life: the unassailable safety of certainty. Ordinary minds are too cluttered with nonsense - and fogged with emotion - to achieve it in any but the most pedestrian circumstance, whilst superior minds often find themselves overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information they’re able to take in. He even struggles himself sometimes. In fact, he’s been struggling all morning - but now, his mind is absolutely clear: John is in danger and must be protected. Waiting for the police to catch the gunman is out of the question: Sherlock will have to do it himself.

He heads down to Mycroft's office where, for the benefit of his latest minder in whose care he’s been temporarily left, he turns in a fine performance of a detective hard at work. He shuffles papers, makes fake phone calls and types manically on his laptop, every now and again getting up to pace around the room in a show of intense concentration. It certainly convinces the clueless sap: after twenty minutes of this, the man's alert stance visibly relaxes and his attention starts to drift. To Sherlock's surprise, his feigned work actually proves useful too: there's new data from CID investigating the break-in at Dyer's house. According to Post Office records, on the day before his disappearance, Dyer received a package from Bond Street (from the Cartier boutique, no less - sent by unnamed third party). (If Dyer didn’t order the package, it was a gift.) (A gift of jewellery to a man is generally a watch.) ( _Mycroft_ has a Cartier watch too …) Sherlock feels a tingle of excitement. He has a theory which may help him get out of here - and this is exactly the sort of information he needs to help him put it into practice.

He yawns extravagantly, declares his research pointless and dull, and says he’s going upstairs for a nap. Naturally, his minder insists on accompanying him, enabling Sherlock to pickpocket the idiot’s walkie-talkie en route, before disappearing into the flat to wait. (When Mycroft takes lunch with his Civil Service cronies, as he's doing today, he's always back by two-fifteen.) Sherlock stares at the clock, watching the minutes tick by. Then, at two-seventeen precisely, he opens the flat’s front door and informs his minder that Mycroft’s ‘in a bit of a mood’ with him for not responding to his calls. The minder’s face twists in fear and he scurries off towards the lift, leaving Sherlock free to slip out of the flat and down the stairs instead.

(Back to the theory. Mycroft keeps alcohol - for loosening tongues and encouraging indiscretion - in the sideboard in his office, and no-one is left unattended in this building - not even _family_ , it would seem. Ergo neither the newly created lounge nor its self-service bar are quite what they seem.)

Sherlock nips into the room, closes the door softly behind him and makes a beeline for the bar. Its neat little fridge isn’t even switched on. Sherlock pulls the door open and (bingo!) there, in neat little stacks on the shelves, sit box after box of controlled substances and a handful of syringes. (Intravenous diazepam. Perfect! That should do the trick.) Sherlock breaks open one of the cartons, pops a capsule from the blister pack inside and loads the syringe. Having placed it carefully inside his jacket pocket, he peers out into the corridor and, finding it empty, exits the room.

He saunters casually up to Mycroft’s office. Inside, he can hear Mycroft berating his minder. He walks in, smiling.

Mycroft’s mouth closes with a snap.

“Had a thought about the Dyer case,” Sherlock tells him airily. “What if it’s not quite what it seems?”” He looks pointedly at Mycroft’s minion who now bears a striking resemblance to a whipped dog.

Mycroft motions the man away with a contemptuous wave of the hand, along with some dark mutterings about reviewing his position.

“Stupid little man,” Mycroft sighs, when he’s gone, rolling his eyes at Sherlock in an ordinary-people-are-so-unreliable kind of way. He sits down on the desk and smiles. “So, tell me your thoughts.”

“Dyer wasn’t abducted.”

Mycroft’s eyes narrow slightly. “Do I need to remind you there was a ransom demand?” he asks coldly.

“Faked.”

Mycroft remains seated but pulls himself straighter. Almost as if he suspects Sherlock is being flippant now. “Why would it have been faked?”

“Because Dyer has run away,” Sherlock replies (because although it only explains _some_ of the facts, at this stage, it’s as good a working hypothesis as any) (not to mention the perfect way of lulling Mycroft into a false sense of security). “With someone unsuitable for his public image.”

Mycroft posture softens and he clasps his hands together, eyes twinkling. (He looks positively gleeful.) “Really?” he asks, part-gasp, part-purr. “Do tell.”

“Something was sent to his Suffolk address, the day before he went missing. Something from Bond Street, according to the delivery note. I made some calls. It was a watch. An expensive watch.” Sherlock pauses, watching Mycroft’s expression. (Which is frustratingly blank now.) (Is he suspicious? Is he _not_ suspicious?) “A Cartier.”

“Really?” Mycroft’s hand moves to his wrist, and he fingers the watch there. “And you suspect this person of being ‘unsuitable’?”

Sherlock feigns surprise. “ _You_ have one? But you’re always pulling out Father’s old pocket watch.”

Mycroft laughs gaily. "You know perfectly well that's just for show: Americans, in particular, do so admire anything that smacks of class and privilege. However, when I simply need to know the time, I use a wrist watch, like everyone else. As you also know perfectly well. And don't think I didn't notice you casting covetous eyes on this-" He taps the rose-gold casing of his Tank W156 with a forefinger. "- when I first acquired it. Really, Sherlock - it's high time you stopped pretending you don't envy the trappings of my success. Because, as I keep telling you, if you were to give up running around London in pursuit of petty criminals and accept a discreet position here instead, there would be benefits."

"A Cartier watch? In exchange for a life so boring, I'd actually _want_ to jump off a rooftop?"

Mycroft makes a soft tutting sounds and shakes his head. "Always so jealous. But there's no need to be. What if I were to say that, if you came to work for _me_ , you too could have one of these?" Pushing back both his jacket and shirt cuffs, he thrusts his wrist right under Sherlock's nose -

\- and Sherlock grabs it, clamping his hand so tightly around the bones, he feels them squeak. Reflexively, Mycroft tries to jerk free, but Sherlock keeps his hold tight and, sure enough, the veins on the back of Mycroft’s hand start to bulge. Before Mycroft has time to grasp what’s happening, Sherlock has whisked the syringe from his pocket and slid the needle in under Mycroft’s skin.

“You … you …” Mycroft slurs, eyes crossing, as he starts to sway. “ … drugged …”

"Yes." Sherlock drags him to his chair and arranges him in it as comfortably as he can. “Let’s see how _you_ like it.” But it’s wasted breath: Mycroft is already unconscious. Sherlock flicks the switch on the intercom panel on the desk.

“Yes, sir?” a female voice says instantly.

Pinching the very top part of his nostrils to achieve Mycroft’s nasal tone, Sherlock tightens his throat muscles to raise the pitch of his voice by a few tones. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to let Sherlock out of the building for a spell,” he drawls in his best Mycroft impersonation. (Mummy always fell for it, much to Mycroft’s fury.) (It was so useful for getting even with him.) “There are some things only he can do. Be a dear and make sure Security know, hmm? Time is of the essence, and impeding him in any way may well ruin things.”

“I’ll tell them, sir,” the woman responds briskly. “Will there be anything else?”

Sherlock eyes Mycroft, who’s now slumped in his chair, head tipped back, mouth open. (At school, there were boys who always fell asleep like that on long coach trips. They ended up with their mouths full of crumpled cigarettes, or sweet wrappers.) In the absence of either, Sherlock picks something else that’s bound to annoy. “Order me in half a dozen doughnuts for five o’clock, would you?”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.10 pm_ **

 

 

It’s started drizzling by the time the taxi drops John off on Westmoreland Street, but he stands on the pavement for a moment anyway, looking up at The Heart Hospital’s calm exterior - all Palladian symmetry, soaring narrow windows and cool stone. The truth is, he needs a bit of time to pull himself together. He’s feeling rather shaky at the prospect of seeing Mrs Hudson again after so long - shakier still when he thinks about what she’s been through - and the mist of fine rain on his face is oddly soothing. It’s only when he senses damp fabric under his fingers that he realizes he’s been rubbing his shoulder unconsciously, as if it were still causing him pain. It isn’t. Hasn’t for months. But perhaps it’s all relative. He drops his hand to his side, takes a deep breath and enters the building.

 

* * * * * * * * * *

 

**_3.12 pm_ **

 

 

221B is cordoned off. (Of course it is, idiot! It’s a crime scene!) Sherlock weighs up the uniformed policeman guarding the front door. (Feet planted a solid twelve inches apart; arms folded over his puffed out chest; apparently unbothered by the increasingly heavy rain.) (He’s not moving for anything or anyone.) Had the man been younger, Sherlock might have risked the Lestrade ID card trick again but the line of the man’s jaw is beginning to sag and, just visible under his hat, his temples are grey. (He’s in his mid to late forties. Has worked for the Met for years. There’s no way he doesn’t know what Lestrade looks like.) (Damn.) Sherlock realizes he’ll have to find another way in.

The door to Speedy's opens and a couple of workmen in donkey jackets and stout boots come out, clutching white paper bags and bottles of Coke. (Of course!) Sherlock darts across the street and is inside the café before the door has even had time to swing shut.

The woman behind the counter is new. She doesn’t recognize him, but smiles pleasantly and asks how she can help him.

“Just need to … “ Sherlock pulls a desperate face (tight grimace, wrinkled nose, raised eyebrows) and squeezes his thighs together for added authenticity, pointing a (convincingly unsteady) finger towards the back of the shop. “Toilets that way?”

“Yes,” the woman says, uncertainly, “but they’re reserved for cust-”

Sherlock doesn’t wait for her to finish; just pushes past the tables, and out to where the open space of the café narrows to a small corridor - kitchen on one side, toilet on the other - and, dead ahead, the fire exit. Bracing his arms, he slams both hands against the aluminium safety bar and shoves.

The door opens heavily to reveal Speedy’s back yard - a small, paved area, surrounded by a high brick wall. There’s a gate, leading out into the narrow lane that runs behind this side of Baker Street, but - of course - it’s locked. (Not that it was ever an option. There’s bound to be a police presence out there.) Fortunately, Sherlock’s plan involves the second gate, an ancient, battered thing between Speedy’s yard and Mrs Hudson’s. It hasn’t been used in years; the wood’s too warped and swollen, the lock too rusty. He takes a run at it, gets a foot to the central crossbar, and propels himself up. The toes of his shoes slip a little against the rain-spattered panels, but he manages to keep his grip on the top of the gate and, despite the bite of splinters, hauls himself up and over to drop down softly into the yard beyond. Straightening up again, he freezes at the sound of a man’s voice, but quickly relaxes when he realizes it’s only Mr Chatterjee, complaining wearily about employees who forget to shut doors.

Sherlock looks around. Mrs Hudson’s backyard is small and neat with little drifts of faded blossom in the corners, blown in from the street. (The yard hasn’t been swept for two days. Not since before Mrs Hudson was shot.) Sherlock tries the back door, just in case, but it’s bolted. (It’ll have to be the kitchen window instead). (That little one at the top has never closed tight.) He moves one of the bins closer and, inwardly thanking Westminster council for having chosen such admirably sturdy plastic rubbish bins (and ones which make little noise when stood on too, and which easily bear a man’s weight), he climbs on top of it, and sets about working the window open.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.14 pm_ **

 

 

There are six beds in Mrs Hudson’s ward. Hers is next to the window, John notes, and a little rush of relief goes through him: the further a patient’s bed from the nurse’s station, the less serious concern there is about their condition. Even so, she’s hooked up to a cardiac monitor and there’s a pulse oximeter cuff on her left forefinger. She’s dozing, propped up against a pile of pillows, her head nodding. John’s chest constricts a little at the sight of her - so very familiar, and yet not. Her hair always used to have bounce and curl, but here, it’s combed out flat and, without makeup, the skin on her face and neck is strikingly pale and dull. John can’t remember ever seeing her look so old or so frail.

Straightening his back, he forces his shoulders down and walks over.

“Mrs Hudson?” he says softly. “It’s me. John.”

Her eyes fly open immediately and, when they meet his, her mouth opens on a gasp. She quickly covers it with a hand, blinking rapidly as if she can’t believe what she’s seeing.

“John! John Watson! Oh, _John_!” she cries at last and opens her arms.

Awkwardly, hesitantly, John leans into them - and finds himself clutched in a fierce embrace - so fierce, in fact, that the Pulsox cuff comes off her finger and the machine’s alarm starts to beep.

The noise sends Mrs Hudson into a panicked flurry, sure that she’s broken something, or has somehow ruined the test. “Oh dear, oh dear!” she wails, trying to clip the cuff back on, “I’m so silly!”

John catches her hand. “Here,” he says, gently. “Let me. Don’t worry - it’s easily fixed.” But as he reattaches the cuff, he can’t help notice how thin she is, how little flesh there is between her loose skin and bird-like bones, and again comes the horrible shock of mortality: Mrs Hudson is an elderly lady, fragile in body if not mind. He’s not sure how old she is - nearer eighty than seventy, he’d guess, with probably no more than a decade ahead of her, at most. The thought is almost too much to bear. Another reason, he now sees, why he’s been avoiding people from his old life. Watching Sherlock die was agony, and it all but broke him. He’s not strong enough to go through that again with anyone else.

A nurse has hurried over, alerted by the alarm, although John scarcely noticed; now he hears Mrs Hudson reassuring her. “It’s all right, dear - he’s a doctor.” And he feels Mrs Hudson’s hand patting the back of his proudly, as if his achievements were somehow hers as well.

However, as soon as the nurse is happy that all is indeed well and goes back to her duties, Mrs Hudson’s mood abruptly alters. She flings his hand aside and turns her head pointedly away, declaring, “I’m not talking to you!”

“What? Why?”

Mrs Hudson shoots him a reproachful glare over her shoulder. “Because, John Watson, it wasn’t enough that I lost poor Sherlock; I had to lose you as well.”

John squeezes his eyes shut. “I’m sorry, Mrs Hudson. Really. I am so, _so_ sorry.”

It’s just as well he wasn’t expecting instant forgiveness, because he doesn’t get it. “So you should be, young man!” Mrs Hudson scolds. “You have no idea how I’ve worried about you.” Her tone suddenly softens, and she takes his hand again. When she speaks again, her voice is shaky with emotion. “Every day, John … every day, I’d read the papers and wonder if you’d … if you were all right.”

“I’m sorry,” John says again, because he is. After what he’s been through himself, he should have known better.

Mrs Hudson sniffs. “Well, you’re here now, I suppose.”

“Yes. I am.”

Mrs Hudson nods. “Then this -" She touches her injured arm. "- was worth it.”

“Hardly,” John argues, but with a smile: now he _has_ been forgiven. He sits down in the chair beside the bed. “You must have been terrified.”

Mrs Hudson snorts. “I lived through the war, dear. Bombs falling all over the place. Whole streets wiped out. This was just a graze.”

“You’re very brave,” John says, admiringly. He means it too. Being shot at - being _hit_ \- is no joke.

Mrs Hudson gives another dismissive snort. “Well, you’ve got to be, haven’t you? Life’s full of trouble. You’ve just got to pick yourself up and get on with it. Learnt that from my husband.”

A shadow passes over her face, and John knows there’s a wealth of pain behind the outwardly bland comment, pain she’s determinedly buried.

“So, dear,” Mrs Hudson asks, when he can find nothing to say in reply, “tell me how you’ve been.”

“Oh, you know …” John begins, with a hopeless kind of shrug, only to feel shame at his self-indulgence. He quickly forces himself to be more positive. “I’m working. Which is good. At St Thomas’. They keep me busy.”

Mrs Hudson gives an approving nod. “Busy is good. What you need.”

“And I’ve got a new flat. Something I can afford on my … Something I can afford. Not as nice as 221B, of course.”

Mrs Hudson squeezes his hand. “If it were up to me, dear, I’d let you have it for free, but Mycroft was very insistent about keeping the place unchanged.”

The hairs on the back of John’s neck stand up on end. “Mycroft?” he asks. “What’s _he_ got to do with it?”

“He’s taken over paying the rent,” Mrs Hudson says, shaking her head in bafflement. “Never comes near the place himself, mind. Just has me going in once a week to dust and vacuum - though I’m not to move anything. A bit of a family resemblance there, isn’t there? Only Sherlock wouldn’t have approved of the dusting, would he? What did he say dust was? I’ve been trying to remember.”

John swallows, remembering all too well. “Eloquent,” he says, his throat tightening around the word. “He called it ‘eloquent’.”

“Yes!” Mrs Hudson laughs, shaking her head again. “ _Eloquent_. Funny old thing, wasn’t he? Full of funny ideas.” She pauses, the corners of her mouth trembling, her eyes welling with tears. “Oh, John - he drove me up the wall, but I do miss him.”

John gets to his feet, and puts an arm around her. “I know. I miss him too.”

She dabs at her eyes with a hankie. “Well, of course you do - you, of all people. When I think about what he did to you - the silly, selfish boy - well, if he were still with us, I’d be tempted to kill him myself.”

John gives a bitter laugh. “Yeah. I know what you mean. But life goes on - and, like you said, you’ve got to pick yourself up and start again.”

Mrs Hudson nods, and John sits back down. For a minute or two, each lost in their own thoughts, neither of them says anything, but eventually the silence becomes too much for John. “So,” he says, briskly, “how are things with Mr Chatterjee? Did you ever patch things up?”

Mrs Hudson raises her chin and sniffs. “No, I did not, thank you very much. D’you know he had _two_ wives? Two! You can’t trust a man like that, John - mark my words.”

“So, you’re like me, then? On your own again?”

A faint blush warms Mrs Hudson’s cheeks. “No, not exactly, dear - no. I joined a bridge club, and there’s a very nice gentleman there. Pays me a lot of attention. Takes me out for coffee, that kind of thing. Seems to want to know everything about me. Me! Can you believe it? Me, who’s only ever lived in London, and him who’s travelled all over the world - cruises here, safaris there ...”

She sighs, girlishly, and John grins, wishing he had half her resilience. “Good for you!”

“Yes, dear, he is. And someone new might be good for you, too. Some nice sensible girl, this time. Like that doctor you used to know. What was her name? Susan? Sally?”

“Sarah,” John mumbles. He doesn’t want to talk about this. Luckily, the arrival of the tea trolley means he doesn’t have to: it’s the perfect excuse to beat a hasty retreat. He gets to his feet. “Better be going. But, tell me, is there anything you need? Anything I can get you?”

“Well, actually, there _are_ a couple of things I need.” Mrs Hudson twists around in the bed and opens the top drawer of her little cabinet. She pulls out a set of keys and presses them into John’s hand. Keys to Baker Street. His stomach drops.

“I wouldn’t ask, dear,” Mrs Hudson goes on, “but I’m desperate for a nice nightie. This one Molly brought in is one of my old ones. Look at it - all tatty and faded!” She plucks at it in distaste. “My good ones are in the chest-of-drawers in my bedroom. Top drawer, on the left. D’you think you could pop round now? There’s no need to come back up. Just leave them with Reception.”

The very last place on earth John wants to go is Baker Street, but how can he refuse? “Night dresses, chest of drawers, on the left.” He nods.

“Oh, and my pink knitted bed jacket,” Mrs Hudson remembers. “This dressing gown is a bit thin, and the colour does nothing for my complexion, does it?”

“Knitted bed jacket,” John confirms. “Pink. Anything else?”

Mrs Hudson pulls an apologetic face. “A bit of make-up, dear? Just scoop up whatever’s on the dressing table. A bit of rouge and a touch of lipstick, that’s all I need. Then I’ll be right as rain!”

The sudden twinkle in her eyes makes John grin again. “In case you get any gentleman visitors?” he teases.

Mrs Hudson blushes pinker still. “Well, you never know, do you?”

“No,” John agrees, stooping down to kiss her cheek. “You never do.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.35 pm_ **

 

 

As Sherlock opens the door from the staircase into the living room, it’s the smell of 221B that hits him first: that achingly familiar mix of pine floorboards, old books and smoke-free coal; the faint aroma of fried bacon and onions rising up from Speedy’s; and the base notes of sulphur, and acetone, and coffee. It’s so textured and full of memories, that for a moment it throws him off-balance. Then he detects Spring Blossom-scented furniture polish and his hackles rise. (Mrs Hudson has been cleaning!)

He stalks into the room, eyes drawn automatically to his desk, to check whether anything’s out of place - only to remember that this is a crime scene now, not his home. (The last people here will have been Anderson and his lumbering ilk, scouring the place for clues.) (And missing half of them.) Things are bound to have been moved.

Determined not to miss anything himself, Sherlock runs through the scant information he has. (Mrs Hudson was hit in the upper left arm. The window was open at the time, and completely undamaged. The gunman is still at large.) It’s enough to be going on with. (To have been seen from the street, Mrs Hudson must have been standing by the window - which means she was either to the left or the right of the desk.) (The sash cord on the window to the right of the desk never worked properly after that ‘gas explosion’ across the street. Even John struggled to open it, and he’s taller than Mrs Hudson. Which means the bullet must have entered the room through the left window.) (The gunman fired, unseen by passers-by. On a Friday afternoon, in central London: he was hiding.) ( _Where_ was he hiding?)

Sherlock walks over to the window to consider the bullet’s trajectory, though he’s careful to stay out of sight. (If the bullet entered from _here_ …) He takes a pace back. (… and Mrs Hudson was standing _here_ , the bullet must have hit the wall over …)

He pivots round, scanning the room, but again the past assaults him. (John’s chair shouldn’t be empty.) (John should be sitting in It - reading, or watching telly, or making sly comments about not being tired and therefore ready for bed.) (Better still, he should be draped over the back of it, naked, and enthusiastically relinquishing all control …) It’s only with great effort that Sherlock drags his thoughts back to the present.

Fortunately, one of the forensics team has helpfully drawn a chalk outline around a spot on the wall opposite (close to where Mother’s pencil sketch used to hang) and it gives him something less agitating to focus on. He walks over and traces a fingertip around the surprisingly large, ragged hole. (This is where the bullet landed after grazing Mrs Hudson’s arm.)

The mark is a double indentation: a deep, central hole (almost perfectly round, ten millimetres wide), haloed by a shallower, less regular ring (giving an overall diameter of about twenty millimetres). (The bullet exploded on impact, ripping through the plasterwork.) Sherlock takes out his lens for a closer look. (There are grey traces of plaster dust where the bullet was dug out, and straight scratches from the tweezers used to remove what was left of the shell.) Given the speed of travel (something like one hundred and eighty metres per second for a handgun bullet) and the texture of the plasterwork and the brickwork below, an impact mark like this points to a soft-nosed bullet. (The weapon is less certain. A hand-gun of some kind, according to Mycroft’s information, so probably a Magnum or a Glock - hunting weapons renowned for their stopping power.) Sherlock’s throat tightens (Mrs Hudson was lucky: a direct hit would have killed her), then his heart starts to race. (John might not be so fortunate).

(Calm down! Think!)

Sherlock examines the point of impact again. The central indentation is slightly deeper towards the bottom, but only just - suggesting that the shooter fired down into the flat. It’s also slanted slightly, the groove less deep on the left-hand side, confirming Sherlock’s theory that it entered through the left-hand window.

He turns sideways, lining up the pockmark in the wall with the window, visualizing the moment the bullet hit. He sees its brass casing burst open, the cloud of plaster dust that erupts from the wall. Sees the wallpaper rip and peel, then flutter to the floor like cheap confetti.

(Rewind!)

He sees the bullet pop out of the wall, frayed casing folding back into shape, like flower petals closing at dusk as it whizzes back across the room. Mrs Hudson leaps up from her sprawled position on the floor. Her yellow duster flies back into her hand. The wound on her arm zips itself closed, her torn sleeve knits neatly back together, and she calmly returns to her dusting. Meanwhile, the bullet speeds out through the open window, back to the gun that fired it.

Chasing it, Sherlock dashes across to the window again, and peers out through the net curtain. (The bullet must have come from the building directly opposite: the angle is all wrong for the gunman to have been in either of the neighbouring ones.) A quick look back over his shoulder, and across the street again pinpoints the exact window (the one to the far left) (through the top part of the sash) (the gunman was standing on something - a table? a stepladder? - at the time). Sherlock punches the air with both hands in triumph - despite all this being information he could have got from the police forensics report, had Mycroft been willing to share it. (Now, to put it to some use.)

Sherlock has local knowledge, contacts who’ll talk to him but not the police, and ways of obtaining the name and description of anyone seen entering 218. But he also needs to get into the building himself. As soon as possible.

Luckily he’s in 221B. Which is where he keeps his house-breaking kit. (And since Mycroft has obligingly kept the place exactly as it was …)

Sherlock looks around, smugly noting the layout of, not just the room, but the items in it. Lestrade’s underlings may have removed the corner table and its lamp, and taken down his skull poster and Mother’s pencil drawing, but everything else is the same: the standard lamp, the bison’s skull, his music stand, his desk-top filing system - everything. Right down to the photograph on the mantelpiece and his ever-willing-to-lend-an-ear (well, _external acoustic meatus_ ) skull -

He stops. (The skull isn’t there.) (Where has it gone?) (Perhaps Mrs Hudson confiscated it again - though God knows why; it’s not as if she’s had cause for punitive measures recently.) (Then again, she was always strangely opposed to there being _any_ human remains about the place …)

Rolling his eyes at her obsession with so-called hygiene, Sherlock heads for his room.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.40 pm_ **

 

 

The policeman on the front door was very understanding - and _unsuspecting_ , John reflects, as he lets himself into Mrs Hudson’s flat. Then again, friends and relatives are probably always jittery around crimes scenes if someone they care about has been hurt, so perhaps his babbled explanation and breathlessness didn’t seem anything out of the ordinary. Even so, he feels a little foolish. It’s only a ten minute walk from the Heart Hospital to Baker Street; he really shouldn’t be feeling faint after so little exercise.

Being in Mrs H’s bedroom is already strange enough, without the added discomfort of rummaging about through her underwear drawer, so it’s a huge relief to John when he finds the nightdresses and bed-jacket she wanted exactly where she’d said they be. He takes them out and sets them down on the bed in a neat pile. Now for the makeup. There’s a handful of pots and potions on the dressing tables, and a couple of small foam pads and brushes. John looks around for something to gather them all up in, but can find nothing suitable. He’s about to stuff the lot into his pockets and hope that’ll be enough to protect them from the rain when he remembers Mrs H always used to keep a stash of old carrier bags in the bottom drawer in the kitchen. Leaving the makeup beside the nightdresses, he goes to fetch one.

The hallway between the bedroom and kitchen is decidedly chilly: the kitchen door is ajar. A tingle of apprehension goes up John’s spine as he pushes it fully open, kicking himself for not having gone back home for his revolver before coming here.

However, the kitchen is empty, calm and ordered - and the source of the cold air obvious: Mrs H has left the little window above the sink open. But as John reaches up to close it, he notices something that makes him wary, all over again. There’s a fresh footprint - wet and gritty - on the draining board, and he barely has time to wonder what it means, before he hears movement directly overhead.

He freezes. The officer on the door implied there was no police presence inside the building - but, even if there were, they’d have come in through the door, not the kitchen window. John looks up at the ceiling. There’s someone up there. In 221B. Someone who shouldn’t be there.

He opens one of the drawers by the sink. It’s full of kitchen utensils - wooden spoons, can-openers, potato peelers and knives. He dismisses the idea of a knife. He’s not going to stab anyone in the back and, in a face-to-face confrontation, a knife would be useless against a gun. A rolling pin, on the other hand … He closes his hand around it and, reassured by its weight and solidity, heads towards the stairs.

It’s only when one of them creak underfoot that he realizes what he’s doing. The sensible thing would be to alert the policeman on the door, instead of charging in by himself. He could still take that option ... He pauses, considering.

But he’d have to go downstairs again - away from 221B. And there’s no way he’d be allowed back in - not with a potential killer in the building. Shaking his head at his own recklessness, he realizes that, whatever the consequences, that’s something he can’t accept. Not when he’s so close. It’s probably why he decided tackling a gunman armed with nothing but a rolling pin was a good idea in the first place. If circumstances hadn’t brought him here, he’d have happily avoided Baker Street for the rest of his life, but now that he _is_ here, he needs to lay a few ghosts.

The sight of the living room, almost exactly as he remembers it, is like a punch to the gut. Sherlock’s desk, his chair, his stupid jacknife in the mantelpiece … Everywhere John looks, he can picture Sherlock standing, giving him The Look or calling him an idiot. Or smiling softly and asking him if he’s ready for ‘dinner’ …

But there’s no-one here - not even any intruders, as far as John can see - and he’s about to admit defeat and accept it’s too soon for him to be back here, when he hears something. The sound of things being moved about.

It’s coming from Sherlock’s bedroom.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.43 pm_ **

 

 

Sherlock is mildly exasperated. His dark hat, gloves and scarf were easy to locate, as were a torch and a length of climbing rope, but he can’t find his riding crop. Granted, it’s not something he’d normally take breaking and entering, but he needs a weapon of some kind, and a sharp crack to the wrist with a length of stiff leather is a wonderfully effective way of persuading a gunman to part with his firearm. It’s also a relatively quiet piece of equipment to use. Which is why Sherlock _needs_ it. He drops to his hands and knees, and peers under the bed again, but there’s nothing there. (Well, apart from a surprising number of books and discarded clothes, and the odd ongoing experiment.)

All of a sudden, he hears something. Footsteps. Out in the hallway between his room and the kitchen. Footsteps - slowly getting nearer.

He stays where he is, waiting.

The footsteps stop (in the doorway), and now Sherlock can hear breathing - short, shallow breaths (whoever it is, they’re nervous), then a long, deep inhalation (they’re about to do something).

Sherlock readies himself for action. Hears a voice.

“If there’s anybody there, show yourself. Come out with your hands up. Now.”

Sherlock’s heart leaps: he’d know that voice anywhere. “John!” he cries, springing up from his hiding place. “ _John_!”

John is standing in the doorway, his thin cotton jacket soaking, his hair and face wet from the rain. For some reason, he has a rolling pin in a death grip in one hand, but he looks amazing, fantastic - better even than he did three days ago - and Sherlock has to touch him _now_. He bounds up onto the bed, crosses it in one eager stride, and jumps down onto the floor on the other side in front of John, his arms open wide.

But far from moving into his embrace, John remains rooted to the spot, eyes wide and staring. “You … you look like … but your …” His free hand comes up to hover uncertainly at the side of his head, almost touching his own hair, but not quite.

Laughing, Sherlock closes the gap between them. “It’s dyed, John. A disguise.”

John blinks, then blinks again, shaking his head. “You .. “ He licks his lips. “You can’t be … You’re …”

“ _Here_.” Sherlock assures him, catching him by the elbows and trying to pull him closer. “I’m back. For good. God, John, I’ve-”

He stops, alarmed: all the colour has drained from John’s face and he’s having trouble focusing. (What the hell is wrong with him?) (Is he ill? Seriously ill? Is _that_ why he’s so thin?) As Sherlock mind races through an increasingly terrifying list of possibilities, the rolling pin drops from John’s hand, his eyes roll back and his knees give way. Sherlock does his best to save him, but he has John by the elbows, not the arms or waist, and his hold isn’t strong enough to stop him falling. All he can do is watch, helpless, as John finally loses consciousness and collapses to the floor.

 


	4. Hypothermia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What John first thinks nothing more than a wonderful dream rapidly turns into a nightmare - and, for Sherlock, things are even worse.

**_Saturday, April 13th - 3.50pm_ **

 

 

Happiness. What John’s feeling is happiness. That’s how he knows he must dreaming. These days he’s only ever happy when he’s dreaming. About Sherlock.

The annoying thing is, knowing he’s dreaming must mean he’s about to wake up, and he doesn’t want to. Not yet. He wants to stay where he is, with Sherlock’s mattress beneath him, and Sherlock’s fingers at his throat, carefully loosening the collar of his jacket, then his shirt.

John’s belly is just starting to tighten expectantly when a sharp slap to one side of his face shocks him into full and sudden consciousness. He opens his eyes indignantly, spluttering “What the hell? What's ..?” only to realize he’s not awake at all, because now he’s got visuals too: Sherlock’s face gazing down at him, those beautiful eyes clouded with worry.

“John!” this dream-world version of Sherlock says urgently, and John feels him - actually _feels_ him - take his face between his hands. “Are you all right? You’re not ill, are you? Tell me you’re not ill.”

“Not ill,” John murmurs, nuzzling into Sherlock’s touch and closing his eyes so he can concentrate on the deliciously real sensation of being held. “ ’m fine. Absolutely fine.” Another few minutes of this is all he asks, a few more minutes of believing Sherlock is alive, and here, and still in love with him.

He hears Sherlock let out a long, shaky sigh. “Thank god for that. I thought-” Abruptly, Sherlock stops speaking. A second later, his mouth is on John’s.

This, John decides, as he lets it take him again, is the Best Dream Ever. The world drops away. There’s nothing cold or bitter here. Just warmth. Bliss. He opens his mouth wider, letting Sherlock in, shivering with pleasure at the press of his lips and the insistent, wet slide of his tongue. The only thing that would be better than this would be if …

Right on cue, dream-world Sherlock climbs up onto the bed to straddle him, changing the angle of their kiss, making it more demanding, more aggressive. His tongue thrusts into John’s mouth, stealing his breath - exactly the way John wants it to, the way he’s always wanted it to - and John finds himself arching helplessly against the pillows as desire and need - and twelve long months of loneliness - surge up inside him. He can’t wait, not any longer - he has to have Sherlock _now_. He reaches up, pulls him closer, an arm around his waist, a hand in his hair-

Hang on a minute! The texture of Sherlock’s hair is all wrong - it’s coarse and dry, not silky and smooth - and it’s wet - properly _wet_. Jesus! This is _real_. What the hell is going on?

Horrified, John opens his eyes again and shoves angrily at his assailant. “Get off me,” he growls, furious, as he struggles to sit up.

The man on top of him, who seconds ago seemed dead-set on ravishing him, backs off - but only a little; he’s still astride John’s legs, a solid weight on his thighs, and when John finally gets himself up into a sitting position so he's able to take a proper look at him, he feels his jaw drop and his heart start to thud wildly. Apart from the ginger hair, this bloke looks exactly like Sherlock. _Exactly_. And then he compounds his cruelty by smiling sheepishly. He has the same dimples, the same twinkle, and when he speaks, his voice is an exact copy of Sherlock’s. 

“You scared the life out of me, John, collapsing like that. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Sherlock?” John asks, his mouth suddenly dry. He feels like an idiot, because _how can it be_?

“Yes,” Sherlock answers, smiling one of his most devastating smiles and John feels himself melting. This is Sherlock, all right.

“But … What … How ..?” he eventually manages, even though part of his brain is screaming at him that none of that matters because Sherlock is here and alive and _god_. “What happened?”

“You fainted,” Sherlock tells him, and he leans in for another kiss, using his weight to press John back against the headboard.

“I. Don’t. Faint,” John protests, around more kisses, freeing his mouth only for Sherlock to capture it again.

“Not usually, no,” Sherlock agrees, unzipping John’s jacket all the way, and smiling at the way it makes him catch his breath. “I have to admit, it was rather flattering.”

John’s sure there’s something he ought to say to that, some question that needs to be asked and answered but it’s hard to think straight because Sherlock has wormed a hand under his jumper now, and is busily tugging the bottom of his shirt free of his trousers, his fingertips dancing over skin that hasn’t been touched by anyone else for a whole year, and - god - they’re _Sherlock’s_ fingertips, and-

\- and how _the hell_ is that even possible?

“Sherlock-” John tries, but immediately his question is lost to another kiss, as Sherlock pulls him up to rid him of his jacket and jumper, but the question is an important one, so John makes another stab at it. “How-” This time it’s the sensation of Sherlock’s thumbs, brushing his nipples through his shirt that cuts him off, and John’s not strong enough to resist that. He gives in. Bugger questions. He hasn’t had sex in over a year. Questions can wait.

“Your coat,” he manages, his voice hoarse with desire. “Take it off.”

Sherlock raises an eyebrow. “Really? Fainting can be caused by low blood sugar. Perhaps you should eat. Are you hungry?”

John grabs him by the back of the neck. “I’m absolutely bloody ravenous.” He nips at Sherlock’s lips. “Take. Your. Coat. Off.”

Sherlock holds his gaze for a moment, then shifts so he can stretch out beside him. "Do it for me."

Leaning back against the pillows, he looks like some bloody eastern potentate - cock-sure and accustomed to being serviced - and John really ought to object, but he doesn’t; he sets eagerly about unbuttoning Sherlock’s coat, his shirt, and the waist of his trousers. He’s about to unzip his flies too when Sherlock’s hand closes around his wrist.

“You first. All of it.”

It’s his tone, as much as anything, that makes John’s pulse race - god, he’s missed this - and he scrambles to his knees, wobbling on the unsteady mattress, to peel off his shirt. The room is cold but he doesn’t care. He flings the shirt aside, and starts on his trousers. Sherlock simply lies there, watching intently, eyes dark and unsmiling.

On hands and knees now, John toes off his shoes, then wriggles awkwardly out of his trousers and pants, overbalancing at the last moment, and falling on top of Sherlock. Sherlock’s arm is around his waist in a flash, and John is rolled, naked apart from his socks, onto his back. He’s breathlessly excited, his dick getting harder with every heartbeat, his skin tingling with anticipation.

“Sherlock-”

“Don’t speak. Don’t move.” Sherlock’s voice is soft, but firm, and it sends another pulse of arousal thumping through John. Arousal that only gets worse when Sherlock wraps a hand around his erection and gives it a light squeeze. John shudders and bites his lip. There’s so much he wants to say, so many emotions bubbling up in him, but when Sherlock starts to stroke him, all he can do is babble “Oh god, oh god, oh god” and cling to him.

He comes embarrassingly quickly, his forehead pressed into Sherlock's chest, and the hand he was using to hang onto him with tightening reflexively around his shoulder. He has a horrible feeling there are tears in his eyes.

“On your front,” Sherlock orders, almost immediately. "Now."

His voice is intoxicatingly rough but, even so, John hesitates. For all that he loves Sherlock taking charge, the moment of _letting_ him is never easy - no matter what Sherlock may think to the contrary - and right now, John is feeling ragged and vulnerable and exposed. He’s just come with lightning speed and - for god’s sake - Sherlock is _back from the dead_. He could really do with a bit of cuddling - maybe even some actual _talking_ \- whilst he tries to process that, but at the same time he’s acutely aware that he’s done nothing to get Sherlock off, so he does as he’s told and, still trembling from the after-effects of his orgasm, he turns over, spreading his thighs wide so that Sherlock can climb between them. He feels Sherlock shrug out of his coat and, for a moment, the heavy wool of it brushes against the back of his legs, before Sherlock throws it to the floor. His shoes come off next, clunking down one after the other, onto the wooden flooring. There’s a pause, then the sound of Sherlock’s zip being undone. The fine, soft wool of his trousers pools against the back of John’s knees - and stays there. Sherlock makes no attempt at removing his trousers completely.

The weight on the bed shifts: Sherlock is stretching over to open his bedside drawer. John hears him breathe, “Thank you, Mycroft”, then the squelchy sound of lubricant being squirted out of a tube.

He takes very little time to prepare himself, and scarcely any longer to prepare John - cold lube shoved in with two fingers, the briefest of stretches - and then John is being hauled up onto his elbows and knees, the fabric of Sherlock’s open shirt a silken flutter against his sides, and Sherlock’s belly hot against his arse. It’s all happening a bit too fast, and - _Jesus_ \- it burns when Sherlock pushes into him, but John pants his way through it manfully. It’s worth it, to hear Sherlock gasp like that, and to feel him shudder - and when he wraps an arm around John’s body, hugging him closer, despite his best efforts, John’s eyes fill with tears for a second time. He never thought he’d have this again with anyone, let alone Sherlock.

Slowly, Sherlock starts to move, thrusting hard and deep. It doesn’t hurt exactly but, so soon after orgasm, and with John’s emotions all over the place, the renewed stimulation is more enervating than pleasurable. John knows he’s going to be sore when it’s over but that doesn’t matter: he wouldn’t stop Sherlock for the world. He wants to make him happy, so he clutches at the sheets, and tries to picture Sherlock's face, to _see_ his eyes fluttering closed, and his mouth opening as he fights for air because Sherlock in the throes of intense physical pleasure is the most beautiful thing John has ever seen.

The bed rocks faster. The room gets warmer. The mattress springs squeak and Sherlock’s hands move to John’s hipbones to grip them tighter. A final thrust, a groan and a bite to the back of John’s neck, and Sherlock finishes - almost, but not quite, as quickly as John. John smiles into the bedclothes. It’s been a long time - apparently for Sherlock too - and it’s good to know he was just as desperate. It makes John feel less pathetically needy.

He can’t help wincing a little as Sherlock pulls out: it stings even more than he was expecting. He tries to hide it but, of course, Sherlock notices. He rolls John over onto his back again, and touches his cheek. “Too rough? I thought … You always liked-”

John stops him with a finger to his lips. “It was fine. More than fine. Bloody hell, I’ve missed you.”

A little smile tugs at the corner of Sherlock’s mouth, a smile he tries to suppress but it rapidly gets bigger. “Yes!” he breathes, clenching his fist as if about to punch the air in triumph. “I _knew_ it.”

“Knew what?”

“Oh, nothing,” Sherlock replies airily, turning away. He snatches up the tissue box from his bedside table and quickly cleans himself up. “Just Mycroft. Machinating. _Again_.”

John begins to feel queasy. “Mycroft? What’s Mycroft got to do with anything?”

Sherlock crumples his used tissues into a ball and tosses them into the waste-paper bin across the room. All three of them drop neatly in. John is surprised to realize he finds that annoying.

Climbing off both John and the bed, Sherlock pulls his pants and trousers back up. “He said,” he explains, zipping his flies shut, “no, he _implied_ \- because he’s too clever to just come out with it - he implied that that woman was your girlfriend.”

“What woman?”

“That policewoman woman,” Sherlock says briskly. He’s putting his shoes back on now, and picking his coat up from the floor. He glances back at John. “What?”

John realizes he must be frowning. “D’you mean Mary?” he asks slowly. How does Sherlock know about Mary?

“ ‘Mary’,” Sherlock sniffs. “Is that what she’s called? Dull. It suits her.”

There’s something right on the edge of John’s consciousness, stalking him, like an enemy sniper. He’s doing his best to ignore it because he has a horrible feeling that, as soon as he acknowledges it, the shadowy outline will acquire weight and substance. It will raise its weapon, take aim and shoot him - right through the heart.

“How would you know?” he asks, anyway. Even though every instinct is telling him he shouldn’t. “You’ve never met her.”

“Of course I have,” Sherlock scoffs, buttoning up his coat. “Well, not ‘met’ exactly - ‘seen’.”

John can make out the barrel of a gun now, the glint of light on metal. It ought to stop him asking, but it doesn’t. “When?”

“On Wednesday, of course. And I very nearly shoved that book trolley into her, rather than Mycroft - the way she was sitting there next to you, all prim and proper."

And there it is. The bullet. Pain explodes in John’s chest, making it hard to breathe. “That … That was you? You mean you’ve been back in London for four whole days and-”

"Six, actually," Sherlock corrects and, as John gapes at him in disbelief, he actually has the audacity to look pleased with himself. “You didn’t recognize me, did you? I told Mycroft my disguises are good enough to fool anyone!”

“Of course I didn’t recognize you!” John cries. “You were dead! You _died_. You died, and you bloody well made me watch.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. “I didn’t _die_ , John. I faked it. Obviously.”

“It wasn’t obvious to me,” John mutters, shivering - and not just from the cold. He ought to get dressed but his clothes are all over the place and, all of a sudden, he doesn’t much feel like walking around naked in front of Sherlock. He tugs at the duvet and pulls it around him. “It wasn’t obvious at all.”

Sherlock presses his hands together, eyes sparkling with delight. He looks like a kid at Christmas. “I know. To be honest, I hadn’t imagined it would work so well. Molly was surprisingly helpful.”

“Molly?” John reels again, as another hot burst of pain goes through him. “ _Molly_ helped you?”

Standing in front of his wardrobe, Sherlock checks his reflection in the mirror. “I could hardly pull it off on my own,” he says matter-of-factly, adjusting his collar, “and you know what she’s like. Always eager to help. When I realized I might need to die, I got her-”

“When?” John asks through gritted teeth. He wishes he were dressed: if he were, he’d be storming out now. “ _When_ did you realize that?”

Sherlock is preening in front of the mirror, fiddling with his hair, as if they were having a normal conversation and John’s blood starts to boil. Sherlock just carries on, oblivious. “Well, it was always a possibility, John. Right from the start. From as far back as the swimming pool. You must have seen that, surely?”

“Is that when you had blood taken?” John asks, as one of the pennies from Mary’s investigation finally drops. "When you had it frozen?"

Sherlock grins. “It was too good an idea to let go to waste. Especially since it was Moriarty who dropped it into my lap!”

John does a quick calculation. “So, let me get this right,” he says, sounding much calmer than he feels, “you had the whole thing planned for two years and you never thought to _mention it to me_?”

At last Sherlock seems to catch on. He spins around and throws himself onto his knees on the bed in front of John. “But I couldn’t, don’t you see?” He grasps John’s hands and squeezes them imploringly. “They were watching you. Your grief had to be convincing - and I know you, John; you’re no good at acting. At the time, you really had to believe I’d died.”

John swallows. Even now the memory hurts. “I did,” he says quietly. “I really did.”

“I know!” Sherlock cries, planting a quick but intense kiss on his mouth before John can stop him. “You were _brilliant_! Your blog, at the graveside ... God, John - I almost cried.”

John closes his eyes. “I did. Cry.”

“I know,” Sherlock assures him. “You were fantastic. So upright and dignified. Military. You were perfect.”

John’s eyes fly open again. “What? _What_ did you say?”

“At the graveside. You were even better than I’d hoped.”

“You were _there_ too? You _watched_ me? You let me … “ John yanks his hands from Sherlock’s. “Fuck, Sherlock - do you ever have any human feelings _ever_?”

Sherlock has the nerve to look affronted. “What happened to ‘You were the best man, and the most human human being that I’ve ever known’?” he asks in a merciless parody of not just the words John remembers saying, but of his broken tone too.

“That was when I thought you’d died,” John spits back at him. “For _me_ and-” He cuts himself quickly short. _Oh shit_. He really wishes he hadn’t said that. Talk about delusional. Any minute now, Sherlock is going to laugh in his face and accuse him of sentimental idiocy.

Oddly enough though, instead of laughing, Sherlock looks angry, hurt. “I _did_ die for you,” he hisses.

“No, you didn’t!” John yells back. “You faked it. You let me think … but you _faked_ it.”

Sherlock’s eyes narrow. “Weren’t you listening? I did tell you-”

“Did you? Did you really? Because I must’ve missed that bit. I wonder why? Oh, I know! Because you didn’t tell me a bloody thing. You never do. Because you’re Sherlock sodding Holmes and you always work alone because no-one else can compete with your massive intellect!” He pauses to drag in a breath. He knows he’s losing control, but he doesn’t care. He’s carried this burden, this weight of pain for so long, it feels wonderful to be able to let it out at last. “Except you didn’t do it alone, did you? You turned to _Molly_. Instead of me.”

“Look,” Sherlock growls, “I told you: I needed you to believe it. Because they’d have killed you otherwise and I couldn’t have … I needed to keep you alive. Afterwards, there wasn’t time. I had to get out of the country.”

Even now, John wants to believe him. Wants to believe that, even if Sherlock’s ‘death’ was nothing but a trick, the reasons behind it were real, and inspired by a desire to protect him. And with Sherlock so close, and looking so earnest - as if he might kiss him again at any moment - he nearly does. Except-

“Where?” he asks. “Where did you go?”

Sherlock’s eyes dart about his face. He’s trying to gauge what the question means, John knows, so he deliberately keeps his face as blank as he can.

“Tibet,” Sherlock says, at last, and John feels like laughing and crying at once. Tibet! Well, that explains the lack of communication, then. It’s hard enough getting a mobile signal in some parts of rural Britain, let alone Tibet!

“Tibet,” he laughs, a little shakily.

“Yes,” Sherlock says slowly, with an uncertain smile of his own. “Then Norway, then France. Not that it matters.”

John’s relief evaporates. Tibet was one thing; Norway and France something else entirely. “Oh, it matters,” he snarls. “You see, I’m trying to work out why you disappeared for a whole year and in all that time never called me once. Never even bloody texted.”

“It was too dangerous. SMS messages are notoriously easy to-”

“You didn’t contact me for a _year_ ,” John reiterates, cutting him off.

“John,” Sherlock wheedles, cupping a hand around his naked shoulder. John shivers involuntarily at the touch and, encouraged, Sherlock begins caressing the skin there lightly. “John, you’re being ridiculous-”

The word is like a red rag to a bull. “Ridiculous?” John demands, pushing him away. “Don’t you _dare_ call me ridiculous. You have no idea what it’s been like.” He rolls away from Sherlock and gets up from the bed, desperate to put some clothes on now. “And now I find out you've been back for _six whole days_ without me hearing a word from you." He snatches his shirt up from the floor and pulls it on. "How much longer were you planning to make me wait? A week? A month? Another sodding year? Would I even have known you were home now if Mrs Hudson hadn't happened to ask me to come and collect some things for her?" He fights his way into his underpants. "Although perhaps you didn't want me to ever find out, if you felt the need to sneak around in disguises!”

As he bends down to pick up his trousers, Sherlock jumps off the bed and stalks over. “Wanting to see you was the reason I was in disguise in the first place!” he says hotly. “Why I came back! For your information, Mycroft wanted me to stay in France!”

Trousers half-way up his legs, John looks up. “Mycroft wanted?” he echoes, feeling a vicious little thrill at the flash of oh-my-god-I’ve-put-my-foot-in-it-again horror on Sherlock’s face. “You kept in touch with your brother, but not me.” He straightens up, fastening his trousers. “Well, thanks for that. It’s made one thing clear, at least: I never want to see you again.”

For a moment, something like terror flits through Sherlock’s eyes, then he snorts out a laugh. “Don’t be an idiot. You wouldn’t be acting like this if you never wanted to see me again. Be sensible. You love me-”

John thinks he ought to be shaking with rage by now, but when he looks down at his hands, they’re completely steady. “I hate you,” he says quietly.

Sherlock snorts again. “Really? It didn’t feel like that ten minutes ago."

"Ten minutes ago," John says bitterly, stamping his feet into his shoes, "I didn't realize you thought of me as some bloody _thing_ you could pick up and put down whenever it suited you."

"You’re not thinking straight," Sherlock insists, blocking John's path as he tries to make for the door. "You’re in shock."

"I am _not_ in shock.”

"You fainted."

"Yes, okay. Very clever. I was in shock _then_ , but I’m not now. I’m going. Don’t follow me. Don't call me. Don't text." John takes a step to the side.

"Whyever not?" Sherlock demands, blocking his way again.

"Because I’m not Molly Hooper," John snaps.

"What? I never said you were."

"Not in so many words, no," John agrees, "but you expect me to forgive you _anything_ , just like she does. You expect me to be grateful for any little bit of you you decide to share. Well, stuff that!" This time John tries a dodge to the left, but Sherlock catches him by the arm.

"This is insane," he says. "You’re making an absurd amount of fuss about noth-"

He's such a smug, arrogant git, he doesn't see the punch coming - but, then again, neither does John: he’s been so determined to keep himself under control and avoid giving Sherlock the satisfaction of seeing him lose his temper.

Now though, as he shakes out his hand, trying to relieve the horrible pain throbbing across his knuckles and up into his finger bones, he realizes he’s failed. But, bloody hell, it felt good. The sight of Sherlock, on his arse on the floor at his feet, slumped back against the side of the bed as he nurses his jaw, feels pretty good too.

John turns his back on him and marches stiffly out of the room.

Because - damn him - Sherlock is right. John does love him. Still. And far more than is good for him.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_4.15pm_ **

 

Downstairs, the front door bangs shut. (John is angry.) (And he wants it known that he’s angry.) (As if a solid punch to the jaw weren’t evidence enough.) Sherlock pats his jawline carefully. (Nothing broken, but it’s already swelling up.) (It’ll bruise.) (Stupid, _stupid_! You knew he would react like that at some point. You should have been ready for it.) (It’s the sex. It’s distracting!)

Sherlock’s limbs feel unreasonably heavy as he gets to his feet. He’s not sure what to do now. (Give John time to calm down? Go after him?) (What does he want? What does he want?) (There must be a logic to this _somewhere_ , surely?)

Unhelpfully, the room decides to spin and, realizing he needs a little more time to recover, Sherlock lets himself sink onto the bed. He doesn’t lie down, just sits. (Falling asleep after being knocked almost unconscious would be asking for trouble.) Gazing about numbly, he registers the fact that his duvet has fallen to the floor. It’s damp in places (from John’s jacket and hair) and dirt-smudged in others (grey-brown streaks of street dust from his shoes) … All of a sudden, Sherlock’s eyes feel unaccountably hot and uncomfortable, and he’s seized by a pressing need to pick the duvet up.

It’s still slightly warm from John’s body. (It probably smells of him too …) ( _No_.) Determinedly resisting the urge to sniff it, or hug it to his chest, Sherlock stands up again and shakes the thing out, arranges it carefully on top of the bed again.

“How splendidly metaphorical.”

At the unexpected sound of a voice, Sherlock’s head snaps round (Gah! That was a mistake) and the room takes another spin. He feels sick: Mycroft is standing in the doorway, wearing an expression of long-suffering fondness.

Sherlock scowls at him. “What? What are you talking about?”

Mycroft strolls further into the room. “You,” he smiles. “This. You don’t know how to fix your relationship with John - I met him on his way out, by the way, in case you were wondering - so you’re fixing your bed instead. The bed on which, unless I’m very much mistaken, the two of you just had carnal knowledge of each other.” He shakes his head minutely, indulgently. “What did you do wrong this time? Too rough? Not rough enough?” Mycroft pauses and laughs gaily. “I must say, I do rather enjoy Doctor Watson’s ability to confuse you. It really is most diverting.”

Sherlock would love to counter Mycroft’s merry banter with a devastating riposte from which there’s no come-back but his brain is moving like Wellington boots through treacle, and all he can do is groan and rub his jaw again.

Mycroft places a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Come along, brother dear. Let’s get you home. You should probably put some ice on that, and there’s important work to be done.”

“The Dyer case?” Sherlock mutters, wearily.

Mycroft looks momentarily surprised. “The Dyer case? Oh! No, not that. That has outlived its usefulness. I thought we might concentrate on keeping you alive instead - and, of course, on getting John back.”

Sherlock begins to suspect he has a concussion after all. “What?”

Mycroft smiles coyly and twirls his umbrella through a couple of revolutions. “The was no ‘Dyer case’. Julian Dyer is alive and well - and very much unkidnapped. He is, in fact, holed up in a rather nice hydro on Royal Deeside, even as we speak. He owed me a favour, you see, although I did consider it only polite to send him a small token of my regard.”

“The watch …”

Mycroft laughs again. “Indeed, yes! The watch! For a little while there, I really thought you were onto me.”

“But why would you ..?”

“Because you’re my brother.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“You ‘died’ a disgraced man, Sherlock. Coming back was never going to be easy - not even on the public, professional level. My plan was to have you return a hero. Julian Dyer is a much loved man. If you rescued him from kidnappers - if you saved his life - the tide of public opinion would turn once more in your favour, and you’d be welcomed back with open arms. On the private level … well, John has so much more to forgive you for, hasn’t he? Or thinks he has. If you’d left it all to me - if you hadn’t been so foolishly precipitous at every turn - I could have smoothed everything out for you. Now, I’m afraid, we have the most terrible mess to sort out.”

“So, Operation Horus was-”

“A delaying tactic, yes. Julian Dyer is a busy man. I had to timetable your triumphant return around his filming schedule, I’m afraid. Luckily, his last project … ‘wrapped’, I think the term is, a week early. Thus I was able to bring things forward when you suddenly decided to leave France.”

Sherlock scratches his head, trying to force his brain to ignore the pain in his jaw, and focus. “You had Mrs Hudson _shot_ to salvage my reputation?”

“I know you’ve had a blow to the head, Sherlock, but do _try_ to keep up,” Mycroft sighs, rolling his eyes. “The attack on Mrs Hudson was genuine. By a bona fide unknown gunman. Whose real target, we must assume, is you.”

“One of Moriarty’s gang?”

“Possibly. It’s not anyone currently on our radar - everyone who was in Britain at the time was rounded up within days of your leaving the country - but there could well be others, elsewhere. Best not to rule anything out at this stage. Although, given your unsavoury career and your less-than-charming personality, you’re not exactly short of enemies, are you?”

“What’s wrong with my personality?”

“Well,” Mycroft purrs, tipping his head to one side, “you’re the kind of fellow who’d drug his own brother for a start. I’d still be out cold if Bentley weren’t so on the ball when it comes to antidotes.”

Sherlock almost feels guilty. Then he remembers his escape from France and subsequent house arrest. “And of course you’d never stoop so low!” he shoots back.

“Touché,” Mycroft acknowledges, and offers a supportive arm. “Coming?”

Sherlock considers refusing: he’d rather go after John once his head stops throbbing. On the other hand … A sudden, bright idea comes to him.

“All right,” he agrees, sullenly. “But I need to stop off somewhere on the way.”

 

 

Fifteen minutes later, Mycroft’s Jaguar is parked on double yellow lines on Oxford Street, and the six-foot four traffic warden who had the temerity to approach, pad in hand, the moment they pulled up, has been sent scurrying away by a single steely look from Mycroft. (He may be insufferable, but he has his uses.)

Bracing himself for a novel, and possibly humiliating, experience, Sherlock quits the safety of the Jag and walks into the hideously-named Floribunda. (Flowers are Romantic. People like Romantic. John has said so on more than one occasion, ergo _John_ likes Romantic. And, by extension, flowers.)

The place is heady with the scent of rose and hyacinth, lily and freesia, and everywhere Sherlock looks it’s either bold shapes in vivid reds, yellows and purples or elegant sweeps of white, cream and peach. He ducks under the dangling fronds of a coconut palm and approaches the counter.

The shop assistant (late thirties, five foot six, a hundred and twenty-five pounds) (used to be a teacher but couldn’t hack the paperwork, lack of discipline or noise levels) looks up. She’s as glossy as the leaves of the bromeliad on the shelf behind her, and her lips are the same shade of red as its frankly alarming central flower spike.

“Good afternoon, sir. How can I help?”

“I, uh, need … flowers,” Sherlock tells her, feeling faintly ridiculous.

She smiles. “Then you’ve come to the right place. Did you have anything particular in mind? Is it a special occasion?”

Appalled at having to choose, Sherlock looks about the shop. (Roses. Roses are Romantic, right?) “Roses,” he says firmly, as if he knows what he’s doing.

“Long-stemmed?” the woman asks.

Sherlock shrugs. He has no idea.

The woman looks at him more sharply - at his clothes, his face, his _jaw_ \- and a slow, knowing smile curves her lips. “Long-stemmed make more of statement,” she advises, indicating a tall, dark vase full of yellow roses, “and yellow ones mean ‘forgive and forget’.”

“Who says I need forgiving?” Sherlock demands, then cringes. (That was a bit of a give-away, wasn’t it?)

The assistant is unperturbed. “The person buying the flowers usually does, sir,” she says cheerfully. “Might I advise deep pink roses as well? They say ‘I’m grateful to have you in my life’. Or perhaps forget about roses altogether and go for purple hyacinth? It says ‘Please forgive me’.” Hand poised over a bloom, she raises a questioning eyebrow.

Sherlock glares at her. “What do have you got that says ‘Stop being an idiot’?”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Sunday, April 14th_ **

 

 

John arrives for work five minutes before his shift starts, feeling pretty disgruntled. It’s been eighteen hours, more or less, and Sherlock hasn’t called, hasn’t texted. This must be the first time he’s ever done exactly as John’s asked and he would have to choose _now_ to do it, wouldn’t he? When there are so many questions he ought to be answering.

Jack Hughes is skulking in their shared office. He smirks as John walks in. “Somebody’s popular,” he says, tilting his head in the direction of John’s desk.

John follows Jack’s gaze, and finds himself looking at an enormous bouquet of red roses. There must be fifty of them at least, in a clear glass vase, stems arranged in a perfect spiral, and loosely tied with a red silk ribbon.

“They’re for _me_?” John asks, incredulous. Who on earth does he know who’d send him flowers?

“They’re on your desk, aren’t they?” Jack scoffs. “Must’ve been delivered first thing because they were already here when I got in. So - come on, tell me - which of your many admirers are they from? Molly? Mary? Or do you have a whole army of them?”

There’s a little cream envelope, John notices, held in a clear plastic prong and set amongst the flowers. He pulls it out, releasing clouds of sweet scent but also catching his little finger on a thorn in the process. Sucking on the scratch to relieve the stinging, he opens the envelope, one-handed.

Inside, there’s a small card, bearing a handwritten message - all extravagant loops and impatient lines.

_This is stupid. I’ve missed you and you’ve missed me. Dinner. Tonight after work. SH_

Trust Sherlock to find a loophole, John thinks almost fondly: banned from texting or calling, he decides to send flowers. He’s nothing if not persistent. Then John remembers what a manipulative bastard he can be and, infuriated all over again, he seizes the vase by the base and upends the lot into the waste paper bin.

Jack to let out a low whistle. “Wow. She must’ve _really_ pissed you off. That’s at least sixty quid’s worth of flowers you’re just chucking away there.”

“I don’t want them,” John growls.

“In that case -” Jack swoops down on the bin and pulls the roses out again, shaking them carefully to dislodge the water that’s poured all over them.

“I said I don’t want them,” John repeats.

“Yeah,” Jack grins. “I got that. What I’m doing here is recycling. Have you seen that stunning new phlebotomist Alsopp hired?”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_8 pm_ **

 

Sherlock had no idea hospital doctors kept such barbarous hours; he’s been dressed in these heavy nylon trousers and Hi Vis jacket, pushing a stiff broom up and down the same stretch of Lambeth Palace Road (dressing as a street sweeper is the best disguise, no-one looks at street sweepers) for over an hour now and there’s still no sign of John (who should surely have clocked off at seven). Sherlock is rapidly coming to the conclusion John left by a different exit and he’s about to give up and take a taxi to East Dulwich to wait for him there, when he sees a familiar figure emerging from the hospital entrance. Working the broom more purposefully, he starts moving in the same direction as John, as yet unnoticed.

John is almost at the bus-stop, digging around in a pocket for coins, when Sherlock catches up with him.

“Don’t go chuckin’ yer rubbish here, mate,” he says gruffly, strategically placing the broom to one side of John and himself to the other.

“I didn’t!” John says, surprised. “I wouldn’t … oh!” He realizes he has a hand in his pocket. “No, I’m just looking for money for the bus,” he explains, with a smile.

(God, his smile is _amazing_.) (And, sadly, short-lived.)

“What are _you_ doing _here_?” he demands, angrily, looking for escape.

Sherlock promptly backs him into the bus shelter, next to an old lady and a woman with a push chair, leaving him no alternative other than to shove them both aside if he wants to get away.

Defeated (he’s far too polite for his own good), John merely grits his teeth and smoulders.

“I’m taking you out for dinner,” Sherlock says, employing his most persuasive tone (the low baritone range, drawn out so the vowel sounds vibrate, but softened at the edges with a winning smile). “You’re too thin.”

“I am _not_ thin,” John hisses, then darts an apologetic look at the little old lady who, apparently nervous of a fight, has scooted further up the aluminium seat. “And even if I was, I wouldn’t want dinner with you.”

Resisting what John would surely consider a patronizing impulse to correct his grammar (‘even if I _were_ , John!’), Sherlock moves closer still, and drops his voice a few tones lower. “I’m open to other suggestions. Anything you want, John. Anything at all.”

The implication is obvious and, try as he might, John can’t pretend he doesn’t understand. He licks his lips awkwardly - once, twice - then swallows. For all his protestation, he looks sorely tempted and, for a second, Sherlock thinks he might cave, but then the number 12 pulls up, and the old lady and the woman with the pushchair move towards it, leaving John free to push past Sherlock and join them in the queue to board.

Sherlock quickly follows and, as the old lady pays her fare and John stoops to help the pushchair woman lift it and the baby onto the bus, he tries a different tack, “There’s someone out there with a gun, “ he growls. “You don’t seem to realize how much danger you’re in.”

The young woman looks up in alarm, and hastily yanks the pushchair from John’s grip.

“ _I’m_ in danger?” John demands. “I’m not in as much danger as you’re going to be in if you don’t _leave me alone_.” He feeds some coins into the glass-fronted box affixed to the driver’s cabin and tears off the ticket that spews from its dispenser with an angry flourish.

“Yes?” the driver asks pointedly, as Sherlock goes to follow him. “Where’re you going?”

“Wherever he said,” Sherlock replies and pulls a five-pound note from his wallet.

“Change only, mate,” the driver tells him, tapping a sticker on the glass that says much the same thing.

Sherlock doesn’t have change. He looks hopefully at John but John just glares back, and Sherlock realizes he’ll have to admit defeat for now, and get off the bus.

(It’s annoying.) (But the data looks good. John was definitely tempted earlier. He won’t be able to resist forever.)

(Meanwhile, there’s the serious matter of keeping him safe …)

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_7.10pm_ **

 

The bus is not one of Transport for London’s finest. It rocks and shudders, whines and moans, and every time it comes to a temporary halt, the hydraulic suspension tips it first one way, then the other, without ever achieving equilibrium. John knows how it feels: after his initial relief at getting away from Sherlock, he’s now kicking himself for having let him off the hook so easily. He should have grilled him, demanded an explanation of not just _how_ he managed to trick everyone into believing him dead, but also _why_. And, more importantly, why - even assuming he really hadn’t been able to let John in on the plan from the outset - he didn’t let him know he was alive afterwards. Bloody hell, when he was injured in Afghanistan, John managed to send a reassuring message home even though _there was a war on_ and in spite of the censors. Sherlock could at least have sent a flaming postcard.

But that’s not even the worst of it: if he were to try, John knows he could come up with all sorts of excuses for Sherlock’s behaviour - excuses that would even put him in a good light. It’s not as if he hasn’t got plenty of them ready to hand: he’s spent the past twelve months telling himself fairy stories about how Sherlock died to protect him. With a bit of tweaking, they could easily explain why he merely _pretended_ to die. No, what really hurts is that, after letting John suffer for a whole year, when Sherlock came back, he didn’t immediately seek him out. It’s enough to make John think the bastard never cared about him at all.

An electronic trill and a gentle buzz in his trouser pocket pulls John away from his bitter musing. He fishes in his pocket and takes out his phone. There’s a text. He hesitates, fearing it’s from Sherlock, but responding when called is so deeply ingrained in him, he opens it anyway - trying not to feel too disappointed when he realizes it’s only from Mary.

_Text: U ok? Long time no speak. Fancy a pint? We’re in the Warwick. Need a 4th. Quiz night. Mary._

Oh god, _Mary_. John supposes he ought to tell her. Supposes he probably should have told her already - considering the lengths she’s been going to to investigate Sherlock’s death. This would be an ideal opportunity. On the other hand, the last quiz night John went to wasn’t exactly a resounding success what with Lestrade having a go at Sherlock’s memory.

Suddenly John’s aware that, around him, heads have turned and quite a few of his fellow passengers are looking in his direction. He realizes he must have laughed out loud at the thought of seeing Greg tonight. 

"Sorry," he says, raising his hands and giving the people who seem genuinely worried by his nutter-on-the-bus routine - the woman with the baby, in particular - a sheepish grin. “Just thought of something funny."

Because he has: he won’t have to defend Sherlock against Greg’s criticisms any more. Tonight, he’ll be agreeing with them.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_7.55 pm_ **

 

Down on his hands and knees in 218 Baker Street, Sherlock sweeps a promising amount of dust from the bare floorboards into one of the clean forensics bags he always keeps about his person. (Thank god not every unoccupied building has an interfering older brother taking care of it.) He may not have been able to find any clear fingerprints (wasn’t really expecting any) (the gunman isn't entirely stupid if he hasn't been caught yet), but at least he has dust. Getting to his feet, he crosses to the window and holds the bag up to the light.

(Grit, mud, fibres.) (Enough to be going on with.)

He slips the bag into his coat pocket and checks his watch. (Quarter to eight.) (Good. Mike’s probably be in the lab - and if not, there’s always Molly Hooper.)

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_9pm_ **

 

It’s not that John has been actively _wanting_ a confrontation with Molly - in fact he thinks he’s been doing a pretty good job of remaining civil to her so far, all things considered - but when he comes out of the Gents and sees her walking towards him, he can’t help bristling.

His annoyance must show on his face because when she spots him advancing on her, she does a little jump, clasps a hand to her chest and gives a nervous laugh. “Oh! Hello. Fancy meeting you here.”

“Yes, fancy that,” he responds, unsmiling. “You never know _who_ you’ll bump into when you’re least expecting it, do you?”

Molly’s eyes dart from right to left. She looks like a startled fawn, and though John always used to like that about her, it’s not cutting any ice tonight and, when she makes an attempt at ducking past him into the Ladies, he blocks her way.

She attempts an Excuse-Me smile but it rapidly crumples. “John …?”

“What?” he replies, unhelpfully.

“Are you-” She plucks at her collar and he hears her swallow. “-well, are you cross with me?”

“Cross? Why would I be cross?” The question isn’t deliberately laying a trap for her, he tells himself: it’s giving her one last chance to confess and redeem herself.

“Oh, I’m probably just being silly,” she says quickly, then laughs again - a tight, strained sound, “but you seemed a bit … tense … earlier, and I wondered if perhaps I’d said something to upset you?”

“No,” he assures her. “It’s nothing you said.” He pauses, giving her just enough time to feel relieved, before moving in ruthlessly for the kill. “It’s more what you _didn’t_ say.”

A look of alarm crosses her face at that, though she does her best to hide it. “Sorry? What?”

“I _know_ ,” John growls. “There’s no point lying about it any more. I’ve seen him.”

Her eyes go wide. “Seen him? You mean Sherlock? He’s back? In London?”

John snorts. “Are you saying you didn’t know? I thought he told you everything. The two of you had the whole thing planned out, after all. For _months_.”

She opens her mouth to speak but before she can explain herself, Mary appears beside them. When she sees how upset Molly looks, she touches her arm gently, asking, “Is anything the matter?” 

Molly doesn’t respond - just presses her lips together tightly and shakes her head - so Mary turns to John. 

“What’s going on?”

“She _knew_ ,” John tells her. “She knew all along and she didn’t tell me.”

“He told me not to!” Molly cries.

“Who told you not to what?” Mary’s brow furrows. “What are we talking about?”

“Sherlock,” John tells her. “You were right. There _was_ something funny about the report into Sherlock's death. Because he didn’t die. He’s _alive_. And all this time, Molly knew.”

Understandably, Mary looks bewildered. “What? How can he be? No.” She shakes her head. “The Guv would’ve-”

“No, it’s true,” Molly says earnestly. “Greg … he didn’t tell you because he doesn’t know. I never told him.”

“What?” Mary plants her hands on her hips. “Why? After everything he went through with Sally Donovan and the Chief Super, how could you _not_ have told him?”

“Yeah,” John approves, folding his arms. “Good question. How could you not have told him?”

Molly’s cheeks flush pink. “Because, he’s kind, and funny, and he’s nice to me,” Molly says, all in a rush. “And I think I might … well, not like with Sherlock, but ….” Suddenly self-conscious, she stops and, taking a breath, squares her shoulders. “The thing is, he’d have been in the most awful danger if he’d known.” She casts a pleading look at John. “You too. And Mrs Hudson. Sherlock said it was the only way to keep you all safe.”

“Yeah, yeah,” John says, impatiently. “I’ve heard all this. What I’m _not_ getting is why no-one thought to tell me afterwards.”

“Because there was a plan!” Molly cries, seizing John’s arm, her fingers digging into the thick weave of his jumper. “Sherlock had a plan! He said you’d work it out eventually, and that I wasn’t to tell you until you asked, because if you were still emotional about it, you’d give everything away and you’d end up ... dead.” She gulps in a breath that sounds almost like a sob. “He had it all planned … “ Another gulp, another almost-sob. “But you never asked me. You just disappeared, and I didn’t know what to do. So I waited. Kept it to myself and waited.”

“This is weird,” Mary says, turning to John. “He’s really not dead? Are you sure?”

“I’ve seen him.”

Mary purses her lips and nods, as she slowly digests this new information. “So,” she asks, after a few moment’s thought, “he’s alive and back in London. What do you want to do now?”

John looks at Molly’s distraught face and thinks of Greg innocently sipping his beer back in the bar, not knowing any of this. He thinks, too, about how unutterably miserable his life has been for a whole damn year.

“I want to kill him,” he says, through gritted teeth. “Right now, I bloody well want to kill him.”

 

* * * * * * *

 

**_10.05pm_ **

 

A couple of minute adjustments to the microscope’s fine focus and Sherlock’s view of the single fragment of fibre underneath it sharpens up nicely. (Yes! It’s not fibre: it’s hair. A bit of DNA profiling …) He spins the objectives around and shifts the 100X into position over the slide. With the magnification up to 1000X now, he can see the individual layers of the cuticle, flaking away from the central shaft like bark from a white birch. He frowns. (This isn’t human hair - it’s too thick.)

“Mike!”

Mike looks up from his study of a recently deceased pancreas. “Something interesting?”

“Too early to say.” Sherlock springs up from his stool and whisks the glass slide out from the microscope. “Can I use your PCR machine?”

Mike grunts good-naturedly, and waves an inviting hand in the vague direction of the DNA amplification suite. “Be my guest - though you don’t normally ask.”

Sherlock flashes him a smile. “Perhaps I’m just glad to be back.”

“Yeah,” Mike nods, turning his attention back to his own work, “that must be it. One of these days, you’ll have to tell me how you managed that. Cuz I’m telling you, if the dead are going to start rising up all over the place, us pathologists are going to have to start looking into another line of work.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

_**Monday, April 15th, 2.15pm** _

 

 

“Sex,” John says slowly. He’s in his first meeting as part Professor Alsopp’s research team and it’s not going quite the way he expected. “You want me to turn up on complete strangers’ doorsteps and ask them about sex?”

Alsopp pins him with a look. He’s got that kind of face; he’s that kind of man. About the same height as John, but more muscular, he’s probably ten years older. His hair is gunmetal grey, his brows and lashes almost black. And his eyes … they’re not extraordinary, like Sherlock’s, but they’re still striking: cornflower blue irises surrounded by a dark circle. In short, as well as being brilliant and intimidating, he’s also rather handsome.

“Do you have any objections to talking about sex, Doctor Watson?” Alsopp asks, dripping disdain. One of his underlings - a dark-haired thirty-something John thinks is called David Armitage - smirks.

Pretending not to notice, John gives Alsopp a wide, open smile. “Not particularly, no. It’s just that I thought - well, I thought that perhaps we’d start with the more standard topics first - quality of life, mobility, energy levels … that kind of thing.”

“And, of course, you assume it wouldn’t have occurred to a team comprising three seasoned researchers, a reader in public health policy and a _professor_ to cover those issues,” Alsopp says, to another smirk from Armitage. “If you'd be so good as to look over pages one to four, instead of skipping ahead ..."

John looks down at the questionnaire on his clipboard. The number at the bottom of the uppermost page is five. "Oh."

" 'Oh', indeed," Alsopp agrees.

John supposes he ought to feel humiliated by his gaffe, and by Alsopp’s unforgiving homing in on it, but he’s had plenty of training in this kind of thing - and at the hands of someone far more willing to call a spade an idiot - so it’s like water off a duck’s back. He flashes Alsopp another smile. “Sorry. Sex. Yes. I’ll get right onto it.”

One of the other team members - Palash Mistry - catches John’s eye. He doesn’t wink exactly, but there’s a warmth to his expression that conveys sympathy and humour. “Here,” he says, handing over a thick file of subject records. “Good luck.”

“Oh, I’m sure Doctor Watson won’t need _luck_ ,” Alsopp drawls. “He may be a newcomer to research but he’s clearly already something of an expert, aren’t you?”

“More of an enthusiastic learner,” John replies straight-faced, as Mistry assiduously hides another smile.

“I’m expecting you to interview at least five patients per day,” Alsopp informs him. “More if you’re not working an A&E shift. And I want the paperwork on my desk the following morning.”

“Five a day. Paperwork the following morning,” John agrees in his best placatory tones.

A long moment passes during which Alsopp again scrutinizes him minutely. “Well,” he says at last, “why are you still here? On your way, man - on your way!”

John finds himself coming to attention - long years of habit, he supposes - and he dips his head automatically in a gesture of deference to a commanding officer, then turns smartly on his heel and exits the room.

It’s a relief to be outside of it again and, at the sound of the door closing behind him, John lets out a long breath. He wants to do this job well for all sorts of reasons. Firstly, of course, there are the patients: major surgery can have a huge impact on a person’s sense of self, as well as their health. Then there’s the undeniable bonus of being able to add research work to his CV and the kudos of actually publishing. And finally - well, okay, _most importantly_ \- there’s the time and mental effort the work is going to take. Time and mental effort that he won’t be able to spare thinking about bloody Sherlock.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3pm_ **

 

“A _tiger_?” Wrinkling his nose, Mycroft takes a second squint at the photograph on Sherlock’s new phone. “Are you sure?”

“A _Bengal_ tiger,” Sherlock corrects (because Mycroft being less than one hundred percent right is always a pleasure).

Mycroft peers at the photo more closely. “And you came to that conclusion how, exactly?”

Sherlock sighs. “Isn’t it obvious? Look at the diameter of the medulla. It’s clearly of animal, not human, origin.”

Mycroft gives a thoughtful hum. “Interesting.”

“If you’d actually read my paper on the subject - rather than stuffing it in a drawer - you’d know that,” Sherlock tells him, pointedly.

Handing back the phone, Mycroft smiles. “I have _people_ for that kind of thing,” he says, pleasantly. “However, I’m still somewhat at a loss to follow your taxonomic leap from ‘animal hair’ to ‘tiger’.”

“ _Bengal_ tiger,” Sherlock says again, making no attempt at hiding his irritation. “Barts have a machine.”

“Do they, indeed? And what does it do, this machine?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Sherlock huffs.

Mycroft tucks his chin in and, opening his eyes wide, raises his eyebrows (his reproving face). “ _Sherlock_. I am not entirely without intelligence. Make it simple for me, hmm?”

Sherlock shrugs, as ungraciously as he can manage. (Mycroft is the cleverest man in London and he damn well knows it!) “Polymerase chain reaction … You put a small DNA sample in, and you get a large sample out. Enough for analysis and species identification.”

“How terribly ingenious. So, you’re telling me we have Bengal tigers prowling the streets of Westminster now. Well, it makes a change from politicians, I suppose - though I dread to think what the _Daily Mail_ will say if anyone gets eaten.”

“I’m telling you,” Sherlock says, with slow deliberateness, as if talking to a child, “that the man who shot Mrs Hudson - statistically, most violent attacks are the work of men - left a trail of tiger hair and soil particles of a type native to certain regions of India behind him.”

Mycroft is infuriatingly quick on the uptake. “Ah! so we’re looking for an expert marksman,” he muses, “from a military background, who’s spent time shooting game in India and has now turned to a life of crime.”

“Exactly.”

Mycroft sucks his teeth doubtfully. “There must be hundreds of people who fit the bill in London alone. Thousands.”

Put like that, Sherlock’s discovery does seem a bit lacklustre.

“No need to look so glum, brother dear,” Mycroft chuckles, giving him a hearty, buck-your-ideas-up kind slap on the shoulder. “Think of it as an opportunity to indulge in a bit of that legwork you so enjoy. But do be careful this time, hmm?”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_5.30pm_ **

 

Interviewing Mrs Hudson isn't cheating, John tells himself, as he mounts the stairs to her ward. Okay, she's not on Alsopp's list but John just conducted two of the most excruciating interviews of his life with people who _were_ , so he's reckons he's earned it. The interview with the elderly deaf couple who needed him to bellow every intimate question so loudly that the entire residential home must have heard him was bad enough, but that was _easy_ in comparison with trying to explain the word 'orgasm' to a middle-aged woman from Pakistan whose limited English reduced John to acting the word out, complete with shuddering, facial expressions and moaning. After all that, he feels entitled to carry out a little background work on less _intrusive_ quality of life areas before heading back out into the fray. Besides, he could do with a few minutes in Mrs Hudson's calming presence for other reasons too.

To his immense disappointment however, when he arrives at Ward 4, he finds she’s not alone: occupying the sole visitor’s seat is a man of about Mrs Hudson’s age, dressed in a smart, three-piece tweed suit and highly polished brogues. Despite a receding hairline, he has plenty of white-flecked, sandy hair, extravagant eyebrows and a bristling moustache. Mrs Hudson is hanging on his every word, her cheeks warmed by a pink blush that owes nothing to the makeup John retrieved from her flat for her. John has half a mind to melt away before she notices him, but the nurse who was on duty last time he came spots him and greets him warmly.

“Here to see Mrs Hudson again, Doctor?” she smiles. “Just a moment, and I’ll fetch you a spare chair.”

There’s not much John can do after that other than approach the bed.

Mrs Hudson is both delighted and slightly flustered to see him, but she fluffs herself up like a proud mother hen to make the introductions. “This is John, Sebastian. _Doctor_ John Watson - one of my ex-tenants. And John - this is my friend Sebastian. He used to be a soldier, dear, like you. A colonel, out in India.”

The old man stands up, looming over John to shake hands. His grip is surprisingly powerful for a man of his age, and he pumps John’s arm enthusiastically. “A pleasure, Doctor Watson.”

“For me too,” John replies, meaning it: Mrs Hudson is positively glowing. “But please, call me ‘John’, Mr … er?”

“Sebastian!” the man insists. “All friends here, eh?”

The nurse arrives with a second chair. John eyes it uncertainly. “Are you sure I’m not interrupting?” he asks.

“Not a bit of it!” Mrs Hudson’s friend insists.

They chat for a little while. John and Sebastian exchange anecdotes about their experiences in India and in Afghanistan - nothing heavy, nothing to distress Mrs Hudson - and then John moves on to telling Mrs Hudson about his new job with Alsopp, and how it’s already taken him to bits of London he scarcely knew existed. 

After a few minutes, Sebastian gets to his feet. “Need the lavatory,” he explains. “The curse of old age, I’m afraid. Won’t be long.”

As he strides away, Mrs Hudson leans over and takes John’s hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze. “Thank you for the nighties, dear,” she says. “I feel so much better in them.” Her eyes, following the colonel’s retreating back, sparkle. “I just hope the house wasn’t too untidy when you got there. I’d only just started cleaning when this-” She taps her bandaged arm. “-happened. It wasn’t too bad, was it?”

John swallows. Closes his eyes.

Mrs Hudson’s hold on his hand tightens. “John? John, dear - whatever is it?”

He doesn’t mean to tell her, he really doesn’t, but the word escapes him anyway. “Sherlock.”

She pats his hand, uncomprehending. “I know, dear. I’m sorry. I should never have asked you. I should’ve got Molly to go - I’m sure she wouldn’t have minded - and I’ve been worrying about it ever-”

“No, it’s not … that. He’s alive, Mrs Hudson. I saw him.”

She clicks her tongue sympathetically. “We all do that, John. Imagine we see people we’ve lost. Or hear them. Don’t let it worry you. Took me ages to realize it was just the floorboards creaking up there, and not the two of you, moving about. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“No.” John shakes his head. Now he’s told her, he needs her to understand. “ _No_. I really did see him. At the flat. Spoke to him and … everything.”

Frowning, Mrs Hudson withdraws her hand. “We _buried_ him, John,” she says, gently but firmly. “We put flowers on his grave together. Remember?”

“Of course I remember!” John cries, too loudly. Mrs Hudson starts at his sudden impatience, and several other people in the ward turn to look at him. John drops his head. “Sorry. Sorry. I didn’t mean to … but he didn’t die, Mrs Hudson. They faked it - him, and Mycroft, and Molly, between them. Drugs, and frozen blood, and god knows what else. If you don’t believe me, ask Mycroft.”

From looking so thoroughly unconvinced seconds earlier, at the mention of Mycroft’s name, Mrs Hudson’s attitude changes completely. “Mycroft?” she says crossly. “Mycroft Holmes was involved? And all this time never said a word to me about it? You wait ‘til I see him again, John. I’ll be doing more than asking; I’ll be _having words_.”

“Oh dear,” Sebastian murmurs, returning to his seat. “That doesn’t sound good. Something the matter?” His eyelids may be heavily wrinkled and drooping but, beneath them his blue eyes are surprisingly clear and they scrutinize John closely. “You don’t look so good, son - if you’ll forgive my saying - and you don’t seem the type to go raising his voice to a lady without good reason.”

“It’s not his fault,” Mrs Hudson insists, and she tries to smile at him but her face is pinched. “John just told me some … surprising news, that’s all.”

“Oh?” Sebastian raises a bushy eyebrow. “Surprising?”

“Someone we thought … had moved away for ever,” John improvises. “They, uh, came back.”

“And this someone is a bad lot?”

“A bad boy, more like!” Mrs Hudson grumbles. “A very bad boy - him _and_ his brother.”

“Ah,” Sebastian nods with a small smile of understanding, as he strokes his moustache. “Let you down, did they?”

John glances at Mrs Hudson. “Yeah,” he nods. “You could say that.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Tuesday, April 16th - 7.46am_ **

 

 

Sherlock rattles off the last few words of his email, hits Send, then leans back in his chair, scratching absently at his head. He’s been up all night, searching through army records, cross-referencing them against the tiger-hunting regions of northern India - Rajastan, Uttar Pradesh, the Chambal valley - but the progress he’s made is only slight. There are still one hundred and eighty-three names on his list of suspects.

As he sits glaring at them, his computer message alert sounds. Switching screens again, he’s surprised (and, yes, more than a little delighted) to discover it’s an email from John. (Wasn’t expecting him to reply so soon.)

_-What part of ‘leave me alone’ do you not understand?_

The single line of text is stark against the white background. Sherlock answers it instantly.

_-Did you read my email?_

_-The bloody thing woke me up. Thanks for that. I'm starting a new job today and I’m on duty all night tonight. It would’ve been nice to at least have STARTED the day well well-rested._

Even on a computer screen, John’s annoyance is coming across loud and clear. Sherlock checks his clock. (It’s not _that_ early!) (Why is he being so unreasonable? You’d think he’d be grateful.) But at least he's talking, so Sherlock decides to show an interest. (Besides, it's important to know exactly where John might be at any given time.)

_-What new job?_

_-Research. Population studies. Not that it's any of your business._

(Population studies?) A cold chill goes up Sherlock's spine.

_-Again - didn't you read my email?_

There’s a long pause - so long, in fact, that Sherlock feels the need to pull up a second site in a new window just to check that his connection hasn’t gone down. (Although if Mycroft’s building ever loses its internet, western civilization will probably collapse in smoking ruins.)

_-Yes. I’m 'in danger'. Just for a change. You want me to check I’m not being followed. Avoid being obviously alone anywhere. Keep my doors locked. Stay away from windows. I’ve got it, Sherlock. Go away._

Poised over the keyboard, Sherlock’s fingers turn suddenly claw-like as a surge of anger goes through him. If John were here, he’d do something physical: seize him by the arms, shove him up against a wall, kiss him - anything to force him to shut up and listen. As it is, all he can do is type furiously.

_-It’s time you dropped this hysterical nonsense. You’re a grown man, not a teenage girl. All right, I get it: you’re angry with me. That’s beside the point. There’s a man out there with a gun who may well try to kill you, so stop being an idiot, and DO AS I SAY._

John replies almost immediately.

_-It is NOT beside the point. Why am I even bothering when it’s obvious you have no idea what you put me through? I thought you’d DIED, Sherlock. Spent a whole year thinking that. So yeah, I’m angry - VERY angry_

Sherlock stares at the screen. (A whole year?) (What is he …?) A cold, sick feeling makes his stomach tighten, and when he starts typing again, his fingers feel slow and hesitant.

_-Didn’t you listen to what I said?_

_-What you said WHEN?_

_-On Barts roof. I gave you specific instructions, John. Why didn’t you follow them?_

_-Instructions? What instructions? I don’t remember any instructions. But I had other things on my mind, didn't I? Like trying to stop you KILLING YOURSELF. Because - stupid me - I really thought you were going to do it._

Fingers flying over the keys now, Sherlock snorts.

_-Of course you thought that. I keep telling you: you were supposed to. At the time. Just as later you were supposed to realize it was exactly what I told you it was: a magic trick. How could you possibly have believed I’d do something so unfeeling as to kill myself and make you watch?_

John's response is back in a heartbeat. All in capslock.

_-YOU SEEM TO FORGET WHAT AN ABSOLUTE DICK YOU ARE._

Stung, Sherlock slams his computer shut without bothering to reply. (Logic clearly isn’t going to work.) (It’s time to try something else.) (But what?) Sherlock presses his palms together, thinking. He's tried courtship - both the storybook-romance kind (roses and dinner invitations) _and_ the more direct approach (sex and stalking). He's tried taking an interest (in the new job) and showing concern (the fainting was genuinely worrying, and John's let himself get far too thin). He's tried reason and flattery and ... (What _else_ is there?)

And then it comes to him.

He's going to have to try to make John jealous.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_5.30pm_ **

 

The sun is still shining brightly when John arrives back at St Thomas’, his briefcase full of completed patient questionnaires. He supposes it’s been a good day: he spoke to twelve names on his list in total, and only two of them were difficult: the seventy-five year old recently widowed man in Peckham who found discussing his sex life not so much embarrassing as painful; and that bloke with the psycho Doberman in Lewisham … John’s almost grateful to Sherlock for having made him race around London so often in the past. If he hadn’t, that dog might’ve torn off more than the bottom of his trousers.

And yet, John’s been uneasy all day. Not about dogs, but the other thing - what Sherlock said. It’s no fun, the prospect of being shot at. Especially when you know what it feels like. So, despite the beautiful weather, it’ll a relief to get back indoors again.

Or it _would_ have been, John hastily amends, if the first sight that greeted him on entering Reception hadn’t been Sherlock - looking breathtakingly beautiful in a crisp, navy suit, his hair back to its usual lustrous black - engaged in an earnest conversation with Alsopp. Seeing him is like being hit by three bullets all at once - one to the head, one to the heart and one right to the genitals. Despite his determination that it shouldn’t, John’s stomach starts to flutter excitedly and for a moment he’s completely unable to put one foot in front of the other.

Alsopp is looking up at Sherlock, nodding and smiling. He looks interested - impressed, even - and the disdain John thought a permanent character trait of his is completely missing. He and Sherlock are standing far too close to each other for John’s liking and, as he watches, Sherlock moves closer still, touching a hand to Alsopp’s arm, as he leans in to say something right into his ear.

Oh god. This is worse than Irene Adler. Sherlock’s interest in her was purely academic. There was only ever admiration in it, nothing more: Sherlock’s never thought of women that way. But Alsopp? Alsopp is different. He’s handsome, and brilliant, and successful, and-

\- and slowly Sherlock turns his head, allowing his eyes to meet John’s. John’s heart leaps. Seems to stop. He’s sure he must have want, and love, and rampant jealousy written all over his face.

Sherlock smiles. Not in surprise, not even as a greeting, but in _triumph_. He had this planned, the bastard, so as he straightens up, positively glowing with smug self-satisfaction, John does the only thing he can.

He runs.

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

**_Wednesday, April 17th - 6.25am_ **

 

 

A Southwark council refuse collection van is just pulling away from the kerb as Sherlock’s taxi draws up outside of John’s flat. There’s a bread van parked opposite, delivering to the corner shop opposite, and a bleary-eyed teenaged paper boy is negotiating a wobbly path between the two on his overloaded push-bike. (Suburban. Tedious.) (The last place in the world John should live.)

Sherlock weaves his way through the green, brown and blue wheelie bins left strewn about the pavement, counting down the house numbers until he reaches John’s. It’s a basement floor flat, reached from the back of the building. He follows the path that leads around to the rear, and runs down the little flight of steps, breathing a sigh of relief when he sees the door is fitted with a standard Yale lock. (They’re easily opened by the insertion of a credit card between the door and the frame in these old Victorian houses.) (Better warn John to get it changed.)

Making no attempt at being furtive (furtiveness only serves to _attract_ attention - it’s better to hide in plain sight), Sherlock slides the little rectangle of plastic he keeps solely for this job up under the lock, angling it slightly on contact with metal so that the latch gives way. A bit of pressure against the door with his shoulder, and he’s through.

The flat is empty, cold (John has been at work all night, the heating’s been off) but Sherlock steps inside anyway and closes the door behind him. His original intention had been to let himself in, then settle down to await John’s return, but it’s too chilly to sit still and, anyway, now he’s here, the temptation to look around is irresistible. There’s no telling what he might find, what useful evidence he might uncover - and at the very least, if he familiarizes himself with the flat’s layout, John will find it harder to evade him and escape again. Sherlock smiles to himself. (As if John really wants to! The look on his face last night said it all.)

There’s a faint smell of cat’s piss about the place, underlying the disinfectant and air freshener John’s used to try to mask it - none of which does anything to improve the flat’s generally dark and gloomy ambiance - and somewhere a tap is dripping. Sherlock snaps on a light. It doesn’t help.

There’s no entrance hall. The door he came in by leads directly into a living-cum-dining area, a mere five metres by four. It’s sparsely furnished: a TV, a table, and two hard-back chairs; a battered sofa and a flimsy pine shelving unit, inexpertly and inelegantly screwed to the wall. An obviously still-unpacked cardboard case sits on the floor beside, giving Sherlock a glimmer of hope: John doesn’t yet think of this place as home.

The kitchen is another dreary little room, despite the window looking out onto the concrete patio beyond. The cabinets are cheap and badly hung, the doors sagging on their hinges; the sink and draining board are of thin, scratched metal. The contrast with Mycroft’s penthouse suite couldn’t be greater and a shudder of revulsion goes through Sherlock. It may only be temporary but he can’t bear to think of John living like this.

He moves on to the bathroom; it lives up to expectations: cramped and damp, with a seventies-style olive green bathroom suite that too much unsuccessful scrubbing has left discoloured and rough.

And the bedroom … It’s _awful_. John was always neat, it’s true, but this is like a prison cell. A three-quarter bed, a bookcase, a lamp and a frayed wicker chair. The less said about that faux mahogany monstrosity of a wardrobe lurking in the corner, the better.

Sherlock goes back into the living room. He’s seen all he needs to see, has all the evidence he needs. John can’t stay here and stay sane. He needs to move back into Baker Street as soon as it’s safe again; until then, he’ll have to make do with Mycroft’s modest little pied-à-terre.

(But how to convince him?)

Plonking himself down on the sofa, Sherlock sits fiddling with a loose length of tape trailing from the packing case to help him think, but it’s not long before the notion of looking _into_ the case occurs to him. Apart from the serried ranks of medical books and journals, John has so few things of his own on display, it’s intriguing to Sherlock that he’s left any of them unpacked. He opens the lid, looks inside-

-and from a soft nest of tea-towels, his missing mantel-piece skull looks back at him. (Aha! So _that_ ’s where it went.) Sherlock dives in to retrieve it, countering the reproachful gaze it gives him with a brisk, “He has the real thing again now. He doesn’t need to get by on memories.”

Underneath the tea-towels, wrapped in an old bedsheet, there’s something hard and flat. Sherlock pulls that out too, blinking in surprise when his fingers tell him, even before the sheet falls away, that it’s his framed poster of the Periodic Table. (What? Why would John want ..?) He looks around at the dingy wallpaper. (If he’d had any sense he’d have hung it _there_ \- just behind the telly - to hide the damp patch, instead of leaving it hidden away in a packing case.) 

Leaning the poster carefully against the sofa, Sherlock rummages deeper in the box. (More sheets, more tea towels and … what’s this?) Sherlock’s fingers close around something a yard long, and slender - and suddenly John’s reason for taking the poster becomes crystal clear. Sherlock lifts the carefully wrapped item from the box and lets the fabric surrounding it slowly unfurl, feeling a slow smile steal across his face. 

He’s holding his riding crop.

 

* * * * * * * * 

 

**_8.15am_ **

 

Too tired to work out an appropriate tip, John hands the cabbie a couple of notes and tells him to keep the change. He’s exhausted - all he can think about is a nice cup of tea and bed as, fumbling for his keys, he makes his way around to the back of the house.

He throws the door open, half-asleep already, and stumbles in, trying to work up the energy to castigate himself for having forgotten to turn the lights off before leaving home yesterday but, as he peels off his coat, a fuzzy memory surfaces: one of the neighbours told him someone further down the street got burgled recently. He doesn’t have much worth taking but-

 _Oh god_. Registering the dark figure on the sofa, he jumps, every soldierly and doctorly instinct to be alert and ready for action kicking in with a vengeance. When he sees who it is, other - decidedly darker - instincts kick in as well.

“Hello,” Sherlock purrs. He’s leaning back against the cushions, completely at ease, long legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles, one arm draped languidly over the arm of the sofa. In this light, his hair looks blacker than ever, his skin even more porcelain pale. And as for his eyes …

A jolt of lust goes through John, although that's hardly a surprise: he doubts he'll ever be able to look at Sherlock without wanting him. “How did you ..?” he begins, through gritted teeth, only to cut himself off. “Oh, never mind. Look, I don’t know how else to say this, but _go the fuck away_ , Sherlock - and don’t come back.”

“You don’t mean that,” Sherlock replies calmly, giving John the kind of look that makes strong women weak at the knees and straight men wonder if they might not be a tiny bit gay after all, and, as John squirms under it, trying to resist, Sherlock gets slowly to his feet.

“Sherlock,” John tries again, even though, as yet, Sherlock has made no move to come any closer, “I’m warning you …”

Sherlock - damn him - merely smiles. “I’ve been going about this the wrong way, haven’t I?” he asks, lightly, oozing a confidence that makes John shiver, despite his determination not to let it. “I’ve been trying to _persuade_ you, when what you really want is something else entirely.”

The pitch of his voice, the rhythm of his words, are so hypnotic that John almost nods. “What-”

And now Sherlock does step nearer. Then nearer again, and again - until he’s right in front of John, looking down at him, and John finds himself rooted to the spot, held there by the force of Sherlock's extraordinary personality.

“What you want,” Sherlock says, lowering his voice to a throaty rumble, “is what you’ve always wanted. The thing that only _I_ can give you.” He leans in now, his mouth a scant inch from John’s ear, his breath warm on the side of John’s neck. “You want a firm hand, John. You’re aching for it.”

John jumps at the feel of something running up the outside of his thigh. It's not Sherlock’s hand - it’s too thin, too stiff for that - but it’s only when Sherlock murmurs, “Over the table, John” that realization dawns. He leaps back, heart thumping, skin on fire.

“Get out,” he thunders, shoving Sherlock forcefully away when, once again, he tries to close the gap between them. “Get out _now_."

Sherlock blinks at him. “What? Why?” He frowns, scraping his teeth over his bottom lip in confusion. “You don’t me want to-?”

“No, I bloody well do not!”

All Sherlock’s confidence and certainty vanish. His breathing speeds up, his movements become skittish and his eyes search John’s face frantically. He paces away. Paces back. “Then what? What _do_ you want? Tell me - just tell me! I know you want _something_.” - John opens his mouth to speak but Sherlock raises a silencing hand. - “No. Don’t bother denying it: I saw the way you looked at me last night. What do I have to do? Tell me, John. _Please_.” 

He looks so like a little boy - so lost and out of his depth - that a large part of John wants to pull him close and tell him he didn’t mean it, and that it’s all right. But he doesn't. He sighs. “I don’t know, Sherlock. Just not … not _that_. I thought you were dead and that was bad enough, but at least then, I still believed in you, in us …” He trails off, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, Sherlock. It's no good - you’ve hurt me too badly this time.”

Sherlock’s nostrils quiver and he bites his bottom lip. He looks almost on the verge of tears, but somehow manages a tentative smile. “But you _like_ me hurting you,” he argues, tracing the outline of John’s arm with the riding crop. “You kept this, didn’t you? And my poster. Of all the things you could have taken from Baker Street."

John stares at him, aghast, his worst fears realized: all along - _every single time_ \- Sherlock must have thought he was just servicing some general need for a dangerous thrill. “You’re an idiot,” he says coldly - because, yes, it was dangerous, and yes, it was thrilling - but only because it was Sherlock and John thought it meant something. He’d hoped Sherlock understood that, and that it meant something to him too: commitment, a promise … He sees know he’s been deluding himself. He shakes his head sadly, his whole world turned upside down. “Just go,” he sighs. “Please - go.”

For a moment, Sherlock doesn’t move. Then, he nods. “All right. If you’re sure that’s really what you want.”

“It is.” John walks over to the door and opens it. “Good-bye, Sherlock.”

He knows he's doing the right thing - it's the only thing he _can_ do - but, as he shuts the door again, the sound it makes is a painfully hollow one.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_9.30pm_ **

 

Sherlock has retreated upstairs: if he’d had to endure a moment longer of Mycroft’s pity, he would have been forced to take drastic measures. As it is, he still hasn’t ruled out the surreptitious addition of laxatives to his supper or a smear or two of superglue on his office doorknob because it’s viciously unfair that, of the two of them, _he_ \- who has no aptitude for this kind of thing - should be the one who needs people, who wants desperately to be in a relationship (although only with John) (obviously). (Mycroft would be so much better at this. Behind that hideous, plastic smile, nothing ever really touches him; if he were the one pursuing John, he’d see exactly what line to take immediately, his judgement unclouded by any needs of his own.) Sherlock snorts bitterly. (How absurd is that? Mycroft: perfect boyfriend material!)

Meanwhile, Sherlock can’t even keep John safe, let alone happy: he can't even concentrate on a task as ridiculously simple as tracking down a tiger-hunting gunman in the middle of London. Even a half-wit like Anderson could probably do better right now. Every time Sherlock closes his eyes, trying to put himself in the gunman’s shoes, all he can see is John’s face, and every time he touches something, it’s almost painful that it isn’t John.

The front door opens (Mycroft, letting himself in again, poking his nose in where it’s not wanted, just for a change) and Sherlock stiffens in his chair, trying to school his features into an expression which conveys both Couldn’t-care-less and Sod-off-and-leave-me-alone.

Mycroft is carrying a crystal tumbler, half-full of whisky (and water - too pale to be neat whisky) (the bastard is rationing me now?) (this is the one low-tar cigarette treatment all over again). “I’ve brought something to cheer you up,” he announces.

“Yes, well, thanks for the thought, but I don’t want it,” Sherlock replies, making a little shooing motion with his hands. “Off you go now.”

“Oh, I think you’ll want this,” Mycroft insists, gliding over the thick carpet so smoothly he might be on wheels. “It’s part of the transcript of a very interesting telephone call.” He brandishes a sheet of A5 paper.

Sherlock looks up. “Information on the gunman?”

“Better than that.” Mycroft pauses. Smiles. “A message. For you. From John Watson.”

Sherlock is out of his seat and holding out his hand in a heartbeat. “Give it to me! Give it to me!”

But Mycroft is too slow in handing it over, so Sherlock snatches the paper from his hand, hurriedly unfolding it. (A woman’s handwriting.) (That new redhead on reception - the tails on ‘g’s are open and angular.)

_I’ve changed my mind, Sherlock. I've been thinking it over and we need to talk. I’ve just finished interviewing a couple in Lambeth. I'll meet you in The Blue Flame on Cadogan Street at ten. John._

Throwing his head back, Sherlock gives a cry of happiness, triumph, relief. He’s getting mental and emotional whiplash from all this, but if John will talk to him, then it’s been worth it. More than worth it.

“Get me a taxi,” he tells Mycroft. “Lambeth. Now.”

 

 

Sherlock's first thought, on getting out of Mycroft's Jag is that John could hardly have chosen a less romantic location - what with the dark jungle of abandoned warehouses they had to pass through to get here, and the drifts of soggy litter clumped in gutters and doorways. A fusty smell of old vegetables hangs in the air and, between the spot where Sherlock stands and the sickly yellow light behind the pub's grimy windows, all the street lamps are out.

(Perhaps John’s trying to make some kind of point?)

Deciding he'll have to have words with John about his questionable (some might even call it 'pawky') sense of humour, Sherlock issues a brisk instruction to Mycroft's driver to stay with the vehicle unless _specifically_ called for (the man is clearly under orders to act as a bodyguard-cum-minder), then heads up the street towards The Blue Flame. Lined with cheap shops and off-licences, it's drab and depressing, and the handful of people moving about it seem weighed down by its gloom, but Sherlock walks on purposefully because he, at least, has a good reason for being here.

He's gone about twenty yards when he senses someone behind him. (Not Mycroft's man: the sound of the footsteps isn't crisp enough for shoes with hard, leather soles.) (Not John either: the interval between steps indicates someone with a much longer stride.) (And anyway, this person is moving too stealthily ...)

Sherlock picks up the pace, crosses the street, but he’s scarcely got a foot to the pavement when there’s a acid-sharp sting in the nape of his neck. Instinctively his hand flies to the spot and he spins around to confront his attacker but it's too late: something has penetrated his skin. Something cold, cylindrical and thin ...

(Dart …)

(Tranq …)

(Dark.)


	5. Tests

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock finds himself in danger, and John finds himself in the wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although nothing graphic happens, I feel I should warn for potential triggers.

**_Thursday, April 18th_ **

 

 

(Darkness.)

At first, Sherlock’s not even sure he’s awake. It feels like he’s floating, adrift in some thick, dark ocean, far from land, his limbs bloated and his senses dull. Then the nausea kicks in and he’s all too sure he isn’t dreaming, and that whatever this is, it’s real.

(John. I was on my way to meet John ...) (Where is he? Is he here?)

Straining his eyes, trying to see, Sherlock quickly realizes he can’t. There’s something in the way. (Something soft and loose.) (Something stifling.) It shifts against his face, folding and unfolding against his nose and cheeks and chin, and he can feel the warmth of his own breathing now. He’s trapped in it, his skin getting hotter and damper with each exhalation.

(A bag! I’ve got a _bag_ over my head!)

The discovery is alarming, and immediately Sherlock tries to snatch the thing off - only to feel hard, metal bands (handcuffs!) biting into his wrists, keeping his hands crossed and tied to something behind his back. He tugs at them anyway, but to no avail. Not only are the handcuffs strong and solidly built, but his arms and shoulders feel far weaker than they should. His legs too, he discovers, when he tries to stand and finds he’s bound at the ankles too. But at least he can move his fingers … he scrabbles them blindly, and finds the bare spindles of wooden kitchen chair.

The notion that this might be John’s work flickers briefly across his mind (John’s sexual tastes lean towards the adventurous, after all) but, when another wave of nausea rises up in him, disjointed memories start surfacing too. (John was angry with me ... Threw me out.) (There was a message ... a street. It was dark. There was someone behind me …) All of a sudden, the stinging sensation of the dart hitting his neck comes back to him with shocking clarity and he instantly dismisses the idea that John could have had anything to do with this: John already knows he’d do anything he wants, and that he wouldn’t need to resort to drugging him to get it. (Mycroft, on the other hand …) (No, this wasn’t Mycroft, either. Mycroft has access to finely-balanced, pharmaceutical grade sedatives. This concoction feels far more primitive and heavy-handed.)

(So, if not John or Mycroft, then who? And where the hell am I?)

Something that wants to be fear flutters around in his throat, alongside the nausea, but he pushes both down, quelling them with a deep but careful breath. (There might be injuries.) (Are there injuries?) He inhales again, checking. (No. Nothing serious. Good. Relax.) But he can’t. At the odd mix of aromas that fill his nostrils, he realizes he’s stiffening warily. The air has a faintly acidic note, underlain by something like wet clay - earthy and organic … _animal_. (Is this a barn?) But there are other scents too - scents that some part of Sherlock’s brain is refusing to identify.

He stills, listening. For several long minutes, all he can hear is the buffeting of the wind against the building’s (apparently metal) sides, and the plaintive cry of distant gulls, but at last, there’s something else, something more human: the buzz of an engine. It’s a way off yet, but approaching at speed and, with each second that passes, the sound becomes less blurred and more distinct until it’s recognizably that of a car. (A large one.) (An SUV or a van.) By Sherlock’s calculations, it’s almost level with the building now, and starting to slow. His pulse thuds in anticipation. (Is this him? The man who drugged me and brought me here? The man who handcuffed me to this chair?) He steels himself, ready for whatever ordeal awaits him, and tries to focus on any new sensory input that may come his way rather than worrying about the sluggish pace his brain and body seem to be moving at - but the car doesn’t stop; it just carries on, at the same, slower speed. (That means something.) (Does it? What does it mean? _What_? Think!) (An obstruction? A bend in the road? No - the vehicle would speed up again.) (Then what?) (A change in the speed limit! Obviously! From unlimited to thirty miles an hour. _Yes_. Wherever this is, it’s on the edge of a residential area.) Sherlock feels an upsurge of hope. (It might be possible to attract attention.) (Someone might already have seen something and called the police.) But, as time passes, and there are no further signs of activity, that hope wilts and dies.

“Well, obviously I’ve lost this round,” Sherlock says bitterly into the silence.

No answer. (If John were here, he wouldn’t be able to resist saying something pithy about that being a bit of an understatement.)

“Although, if you were hoping for points for originality,” Sherlock goes on, partly to hear how his voice sounds in this place, to get some sense of the size and shape of it, and partly because a touch of bravado in a tight corner always makes him feel better, “I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you.”

Again, there’s no answer. (Didn’t really expect one.)

“This isn’t the first time I’ve been tranquillized and held prisoner.” He turns his head, testing the echo. “It isn’t even the first time _this month_.”

Annoyingly, the echo doesn’t tell him much. Just that the building is large and mostly empty. (Well, it’s about to be emptier still.) Sherlock’s had an idea. He rocks his hips, and the chair legs move. He does it again, and the chair scrapes forwards. (Success!) (Get to a wall. Find a door. It’ll be easier to attract attention - and help - from there.)

His progress is slow and exhausting (involving a lot of unpleasant sweating) (and some even _more_ unpleasant dry heaving). In a couple of places, a small obstruction, or a deeper hollow in the floor, threaten to send the chair toppling over, and him with it, but at last, the toe of his shoe strikes metal. He stops, takes a deep breath, and shouts. Over and over again. No-one answers. No-one comes.

And here, next to the wall, he can’t tell himself he doesn’t know what else, beyond animals, this place smells of: it smells of rusted metal and the sea.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_12.30pm_ **

Although it’s almost lunchtime by the time John finishes the last of the day’s research interviews, he isn’t feeling very hungry. He’d blame his lack of appetite on working nights this week, but he knows his problem isn’t the disruption to his circadian rhythms; it’s that last encounter with Sherlock. It keeps going round and round in his head, and each time he replays it, he tries giving it a different ending. Sometimes Sherlock kisses him tenderly and begs forgiveness; sometimes he simply tears John’s clothes off and shags him senseless. At other times, they talk: Sherlock explains, John listens. Or John talks, and Sherlock holds him, promising to do whatever it will take to win his trust again. Each of them has its appeal - including the being shagged senseless, John has to admit - but all of them leave him feeling disappointed because, for a variety of reasons, he can’t picture a single one of them actually happening.

After waiting to hear the door click properly shut behind him, he descends the little flight of steps outside his elderly interviewees’ block of flats and lets himself out through the cheap metal gate onto the street, promising himself that the next time he runs into Sherlock, he’ll be ready for him. He’ll have everything he wants to say right on the tip of his tongue. He’ll devastate Sherlock with the force of his argument and put him right on all manner of things. And Sherlock will be so impressed, not to say chastened, he won’t even _try_ getting a word in. Meanwhile, John really should eat. Skipping breakfast was one thing; but, after hardly eating yesterday either, he’s going to be more like a zombie than a surgeon in A &E tonight if he tries living off tea with no sugar for much longer.

Crossing the street, he remembers he glimpsed an interesting-looking pub on the way here. Well, he glimpsed several, but this one had a strange name - The Blue Flame - and it made him think, for the first time in decades, of an advert he saw on telly as a kid. It was for fuel of some kind, and featured a blue flame with a smiling face and, in the background, a song he didn’t recognize at the time. Now, as he turns the corner, and the pub sign comes into view, he finds himself absently mindedly humming it. _Smoke gets in your eyes_. It seems oddly appropriate right now. Maybe it’s an omen.

The street is run-down and dirty but, inside, the pub is surprisingly comfortable: John’s not worried that the seats are a bit battered, nor that the carpet’s threadbare, so long as it’s clean and the other customers don’t look actively dangerous. He orders a chicken pie, and takes a glass of orange juice over to a vacant table to await its arrival. He’s whiling away the time, reading adverts for live gigs and posters advising drinkers to choose a designated driver, when the seat opposite scrapes against a table leg as it’s pulled out from under it.

Greg Lestrade grunts a hello, sets his pint on the table and sits down. “Not sure it says anything good about either of us that we keep bumping into each other in drinking establishments.”

John looks at the tall glass of foaming brown liquid and raises an eyebrow. “Drinking on duty, Inspector?”

“It’s _shandy_ ,” Greg informs him, with a little grimace. “I’m blending in.” He takes a sip of his drink, leans forwards and lowers his voice. “Got a report of a bloke hanging about here last night with a gun.”

A throb of pain goes through John’s shoulder and he thinks of Mrs Hudson, in her hospital bed. “Was anyone hurt?” he asks, dreading the answer.

Wrinkling his nose, Greg shakes his head. “Not as far as we know,” he sighs. “No admissions for gunshot wounds anywhere across the whole of London.”

“You sound disappointed.”

Greg sighs again. “Probably cuz I am. Was hoping it might be the same bloke who shot Mrs Hudson. Might get the papers off my back. I suppose you’ve seen them?”

John hasn’t. He shakes his head, and Greg gives a heartfelt groan.

“God knows how they got hold of the story, but they’ve blown it out of all proportion. There are people out there getting raped and murdered every day. Don’t get me wrong - I like Mrs Hudson - but she wasn’t even seriously injured. Not that you’d know it from reading _The Mail_. You’d think she’d been riddled with bullets. ‘What is London coming to when a frail old lady lady who survived the Luftwaffe gets shot _in broad daylight_ in a respectable district like Westminster’,” he airquotes crossly. “Then there’s all the usual stuff about how crap the Met are, and how we couldn’t run a piss-up in a brewery. The Chief is not a happy man.”

John sucks his teeth in sympathy. “So the pressure’s on?”

“Yeah, you could say that.” Greg nods, and falls silent, gazing glumly into his drink. He looks tired, sad - and for reasons that go beyond his troubles at work.

“And, uh-” John begins, unsure whether he should ask. “How are you apart from that? Is everything all right?”

Greg lifts his glass and take a long sip from it, the skin around his Adam’s apple noticeably tight as he swallows. “Between me and Molly, you mean? About as all right as it is between you and Sherlock, I’d imagine.”

Damn. This is just what John was afraid of. “You can’t blame _her_ ,” he insists. “You know what he’s like.”

“Yeah, I do,” Greg nods. “All too well, god help me. Worst of it is, given what was at stake, I can’t even blame _him_. All the same, it would’ve been nice to’ve been told at some point. Before my disciplinary hearing, for instance. Or even afterwards, when I was on the point of packing it all in. I could’ve done with some self-belief about then.”

“I know what you mean,” John says quietly, because he does.

“And you’ve got to wonder, haven’t you? For someone to keep something like that from you, at a time like that, whether they’d ever really cared about you at all.” Greg drains half his glass in one go and again swallows hard.

“Yeah. Exactly,” John agrees.

“But I’m buggered either way,” Greg goes on. “The thing is, even if she doesn’t love me, I love her. Best thing that ever happened to me. I mean, I know she’s a bit - _different_ , but she’s great - in so many ways - and god knows, it’s not like I’m perfect.”

It’s like looking into a mirror, John thinks - or hearing himself speak - and it’s bloody annoying. Is this what _he_ sounds like? Well, he’s nobody’s doormat, not even Sherlock’s. _Especially_ not Sherlock’s. Not now. “They lied to us,” he growls, though if he’s cross, it’s mostly at himself.

A middle-aged woman in an ill-fitting, black polyester skirt stomps over to the table, carrying a plain white plate on which a depressingly pallid pie is slithering around forlornly. She slaps it down on the table in front of John, heedless of the way the cuff of her faded floral blouse trails over it, then leaves, without saying a single word.

“It wasn’t exactly lying, though, was it?” Greg says, earnestly, once she’s gone. “More like not telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but.”

“Okay,” John concedes, through gritted teeth, picking up his cutlery. “They may not have lied, but they deliberately _deceived_ us.”

“For the best of reasons,” Greg says. “Moriarty was going to kill us both. You know that. They had to make _you_ believe Sherlock was dead. If they hadn’t, neither of us would be sitting here today.”

“So, you’re fine with it, are you?” John demands, giving his chicken pie a vicious stab with the pub’s cheap knife. “Being kept in the dark for your own good? Like a child?”

Greg shrugs. “I wasn’t at first. Not by a long chalk. We had a blazing row about it. You should see Molly when she loses it. There’s a lot of passion under that sweet exterior.” A fond smile crosses his face; then he seems to realize he’s disclosing more than he’d intended and a spot of pink appears his cheeks. He clears his throat and takes another sip from his drink. “They couldn’t tell us beforehand because you had to believe it - and besides, they didn’t have much time. They had to improvise. Sherlock had had some of it planned for a while, but none of his plans involved throwing himself off a rooftop. It was a bloody dangerous thing to opt for. He could’ve died for real …They’re both scientists, of course, and Sherlock had calculated all the angles, and the speed he’d be falling at, and where the van would be, but they didn’t know for sure something wouldn’t go horribly wrong. Molly says she was terrified.”

At Greg’s words, John feels a flutter of self-doubt but he swallows it down fiercely, along with a mouthful of decidedly dry pie. “Still doesn’t explain why they didn’t tell us afterwards,” he argues. “Why the pair of them let me go on thinking Sherlock was dead for _a whole year_. I fell apart, Greg - I bloody well fell apart.” And now it’s John’s turn to think he’s said too much. It’s not a period he’s proud of. Objectively speaking, much worse things happened in Afghanistan, things involving his fellow soldiers - his _mates_ , for God’s sake - and women, even _kids_ ; but those he could cope with. It was losing Sherlock that sent him spiralling down into despair.

Greg reaches across the table and clasps his forearm. “I’m sorry, John. I wish we’d known where you were. Been there for you.”

John shakes him off. “It wouldn’t have changed anything though, would it? Molly still wouldn’t have told me. She didn’t tell me even after you got stabbed.”

“No, I know. She said Sherlock made her promise she’d wait until _you_ asked _her_.”

John’s grip on his knife and fork tightens. “Why the hell would I _ask_? There was nothing _to_ ask! I saw him _die_ , remember?”

“Yeah, and how you must’ve felt … well, it doesn’t bear thinking about, but he swore to Molly there were things he was going to say to you, before he jumped. Things he knew would get you thinking. He said it would take you a bit of time to work them out, but that was good because it meant that by the time you did, MI5 would’ve rounded up Moriarty’s hitmen and you’d be safe.”

A chill runs up John’s spine. Is this why Sherlock expected to be welcomed back with open arms? Why he’s never once thought to acknowledge the pain John’s been through and apologize? He thought John would have worked out he hadn’t died? John starts to wonder whether he’s much stupider than even Sherlock thinks, because all he can remember from before the horrible moment Sherlock started falling is Sherlock talking utter bloody rubbish, saying things like “I’m a fake … I want you to tell Lestrade … Mrs Hudson … Molly … It’s a trick. Just a magic trick …”

 _Oh_. John’s world lurches unpleasantly.

“Oh god,” he murmurs. “I should have done as he said. If I’d come to you, if I’d told you he confessed to having made Moriarty up-”

“I’d’ve said the evidence certainly pointed that way,” Greg supplies, as though John were asking a question. “Just like I did, that first night in the pub.”

“Yeah. And, just like then, I’d have argued with you,” John nods. “Felt surer than ever that he hadn’t been lying to me all that time.” He’s beginning to understand now. A row defending Sherlock’s good name would have fired him up, made him look for ways to prove Lestrade wrong. “And if I’d said the same to Mrs Hudson …” John breaks off. Mrs Hudson would have laughed, and asked how, if Sherlock hadn’t been who he claimed to be, he’d ever have convinced that jury in Florida her husband was guilty of first degree murder. And - _God_ \- if he’d gone to Molly …

“Jesus,” John breathes, shaking his head at how slow he’s been. “He was right: I _am_ an idiot. I thought-” He stops, dry throat working painfully. He can’t say it. Can’t tell Greg what’s been bothering him ever since Sherlock came back. That he was sure - especially after their last encounter - that whilst Sherlock may well love him, it’s the kind of love you might give a child, a dog, something dependent - paternal, condescending and unequal. Admitting _that_ \- and the reasons behind it - would be like taking his clothes off in public and inviting people to laugh at him. “I just thought he was being an arrogant dick,” he says hastily, when he realizes Greg is waiting for him to finish his sentence. “As per usual.”

Greg’s smile is all sympathy. “Can’t blame you there.”

“So,” John says slowly, piecing it all together, “he really thought I’d know?”

“He told Molly working it out would take you two weeks tops.”

“He overestimated me,” John says, embarrassed now.

“No,” Greg insists. “He _underestimated_ how badly him dying would hit you.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

It’s been _hours_ since Sherlock reached the wall, and nothing’s happened. No-one’s heard him, and no-one’s come.

(Shouting isn’t going to work.) (Obviously.) (Need to think of something else.)

Sherlock struggles against the cuffs around his wrists and ankles yet again, with the same (predictable) lack of success.

(Escapology’s not exactly my strong suit.) (Should have paid more attention at that charming Chinese circus.) (Though, in my defence, _these_ bonds are all metal. _They_ don’t give.)

(Where’s the weak point? There must be a weak point. There’s always a weak point …)

(The chair!)

Sherlock shuffles it quickly around and, driving down hard with his feet, throws himself backwards, launching the chair into the wall. He cracks the back of his head and the corrugated metal panel shudders hollowly under the impact, but the chair itself remains obstinately intact.

Sherlock sighs (if at first you don’t succeed …) and, bracing himself for another blow to the head, he tries again.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_3.00 pm_**

Going to bed during the day doesn’t seem quite so strange when the weather’s bad. Rain is rattling against the window as John undresses, making the flat feel even more chilly and damp. Even so, he doubts he’ll sleep. Brushing his teeth, he glances up at the bathroom cabinet. There’s some Zolpidem in there, prescribed almost seven months ago when he finally admitted he needed help with his grief; half a tablet now might help him get some proper rest before tonight’s shift; might stop the thoughts that have been whirling around his head ever since talking to Greg.

He rinses out with mouthwash and spits into the sink. No. No drugs. This guilt and confusion is a bed of his own making. He’ll have to lie in it.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Sherlock has had to stop hurling himself around. The chair may be unbroken, but _he’s_ shattered. The drug-induced nausea has subsided at last, but now he’s got a raging headache instead, and his shoulders and lower back are killing him. And that’s not even the worst of it: the pressure on his bladder is becoming unbearable. As if being tied to a chair with a bag over his head weren’t humiliation enough, now the prospect of losing control of his body and ruining a perfectly good pair of trousers is looming. The last time that happened … Sherlock shudders, trying to push the memory away, but it hits him anyway. He was eleven, half-dressed and afraid, and that man’s hands were _everywhere_.

(Stop it. Stop it now. Think about something else. _Do_ something.)

Sherlock knows it’s too much to hope that his phone is still in his pocket (any criminal worth his salt would have taken it immediately). (And if it were there, Mycroft would certainly have called by now. Fussing. _Interfering_. Wanting to know how things went with John …)

( _John_.) Just the thought of him makes Sherlock’s chest ache. (Why won’t he be _reasonable_?) Sherlock can understand him being upset and angry, after spending so long thinking him dead, but now he knows the truth - and that Sherlock wants nothing more than to get things back to how they were - instead of being relieved, or grateful, why does he have to insist on claiming he wants nothing more to do with him? Sherlock gives a dismissive snort. (I’ve seen the way he looks at me.) (Heard the way his breathing speeds up when I’m close.) ( _Felt_ him shiver at the slightest touch.) Sherlock’s sure there must be _something_ he can do to melt that pig-headed resistance.

Then again, he was equally sure his last approach would work and it didn’t. (Why didn’t it work? It’s _always_ worked!) A series of images floods Sherlock’s brain, in swift and vivid confirmation: John, braced against the bedroom wall; John over the desk; John flat on his stomach on the bed; John, half-naked and pressed up against the kitchen worktop - each time panting, and sweat-soaked, and utterly _Sherlock’s_.

Even now, Sherlock can’t help responding to the intoxicating pictures and his blood rushes enthusiastically south (John is always so delightfully easy to please afterwards, his orgasms so intense, it’s like being the world’s greatest lover) and even if Sherlock’s never really enjoyed hurting John, he certainly enjoys what it does to him - the way it undoes his endless patience and his soldierly self-control.

(Damn.) (Talking of self-control …) Clenching his jaw and trying not to squirm too much as his bladder reminds him yet again how full it is, Sherlock tries telling himself he’s not here at all (wherever ‘here’ is); he’s not tied to a chair in this draughty warehouse, but is actually somewhere in central London, at the height of summer, where it’s so hot there’s sweat rolling down between his shoulder blades and he’d sell his soul (if souls existed) for a long, cold drink. (The air is thick with the smell of hot rubber from the tyres of passing cars. Dust everywhere, dry and choking. Sudden bursts of sunlight between shop fronts. Too many people, too close-)

The details are so clear in Sherlock’s head that the scenario is almost working, when the sound of a single vehicle approaching breaks his concentration and shatters it to pieces. He scarcely has time to mentally curse the driver before hearing the bite of brake pads, as the engine cuts out completely. A car door opens and closes. Heavy feet tramp purposefully over loose gravel. Sherlock holds his breath.

Metal rattles against metal as a key enters a lock, and a bolt slides open. A long metallic rumble follows, muted at first, then louder, clanging and grinding erratically, before finally easing into a quieter, more even scrape. Meanwhile the air around Sherlock is changing, becoming warmer but less still, and suddenly there’s light visible beneath the bottom of the bag over his head - a brilliant, almost blinding, white.

He opens his mouth to shout (whoever this is has a key, thus their intent is not benign, but someone else might hear), but a fat, sweaty palm smelling of rust and oil clamps down quickly over it, the thick thumb and forefinger pinching Sherlock’s nostrils shut, and the door is closed again with an emphatic bang. Struggling uselessly, Sherlock feels himself - and the chair - being unceremoniously dragged away from the door and back towards the centre of the building, where he’s finally let go with a contemptuous shove. The chair wobbles dangerously beneath him but, thankfully, doesn’t fall and he gasps in a few, much-needed breaths.

“You can yell all you like now,” the owner of the fat hand informs him, dragging at the chair again. “No-one’ll hear you from here.” (He smells of stale sweat and cigarette smoke, and he’s far too close. Tall, as well as overweight. And strong.)

“What do you want?” Sherlock demands. “Why are you doing this?”

The man laughs nastily. “That’s for me to know and you to find out, innit? Now, hold still.” Rough fingers seize Sherlock’s left arm, whilst others release the handcuff from his wrist but, as Sherlock he shakes out his hand and flexes his fingers, something touches the base of his spine making him jump. The old terror is still there - despite John, despite all they’ve done together - but Sherlock forces himself to pretend it isn’t, and he determinedly relaxes the suddenly tight muscles in his buttocks and back. His captor doesn’t appear to notice any of it (thank God) and Sherlock realizes with immense relief that the man’s attention is directed at the chair, not himself. In fact, a little click, followed by another tell him all he’s doing is securing the chair to some fixed point behind him with the handcuff he’s taken from Sherlock’s wrist.

“Right. That should hold you. No more trips across the floor for you, Mr Holmes.”

(Mr Holmes.) (He knows who I am. This isn’t a random kidnapping - it has purpose.)

“You have me at a disadvantage,” Sherlock comments lightly. “You know _my_ name, but you haven’t told me yours.”

“My name don’t matter.”

Sherlock hears the man walk away, and for a moment, expects to be left alone again, but then he realizes the man is moving things around on the floor nearby, picking them up, and putting them aside. (He’s looking for something.) At last he seems satisfied, and comes back, placing something large and plastic on Sherlock’s lap.

Rapidly, he runs his free hand over it. (It’s a bucket!)

“For your _convenience_ ,” the man grunts. “I’d’ve let you piss yourself, but apparently that’s not _civilized_.”

(Ah - this man is the monkey, not the organ-grinder.) (And the organ-grinder is someone with standards - of a sort.) “How am I supposed to-” Sherlock brandishes the bucket impatiently. “-with _this_?”

“You’re a detective, ain’t ya? Work it out.”

(He knows my name, and what I do, but neither is important to _him_ , only his employer.)

If Sherlock weren’t so desperate, he might be able to think of a way of turning this new-found knowledge to his advantage; as it is, he can’t scarcely think at all. Fumbling, one-handed and frantic, to open his flies, he manoeuvres the bucket into position with his knees and forces his half-hard cock (thinking about John was a mistake) in what he hopes is the right direction. Relieving himself is bliss and, behind his blindfold, his eyelids close with the sheer pleasure of it. Seconds later, of course, he’s mortified and furious, and as he tucks himself quickly away and sets the bucket down on the floor, he pulls himself up taller in his seat, and adopts an imperious tone. “Tell me what this is about. Who do you work for? Quickly!”

There’s no answer, just the sound of the man moving about again, taking the bucket off to a corner and emptying it. When Sherlock hears him coming back, he tries again.

“I said-”

He’s cut off by something being shoved up under the bottom of the bag and into his mouth, and he jerks in self-defence when a sharp edge grazes his tongue and something solid hits his teeth. His free hand flies up to grab at the offending article (is this bastard trying to choke me?) only to hear his captor laugh.

“Easy! Easy! It ain’t gonna kill you. It ain’t even drugged. Sports drink. One of them isotonic things. The guv reckoned you’d need it.”

It’s true: now that Sherlock has the thing in his hand, the size and shape of the bottle are distinctive (and the taste is certainly hideous enough to appeal to the kind pea-brained delinquents who imagine they only need to put on a tracksuit to become an athlete). He glugs it down anyway. (If there’s a fight, it’ll be better to be hydrated, and with a few calories on board.)

“How very thoughtful of him,” he drawls, as the empty bottle is snatched away again, and his hand cuffed once more behind his back. “Do, please, pass on my thanks.”

“No need,” the man grunts, and by the sound of his voice, Sherlock can tell he’s walking away. “You’ll be meeting him yourself soon enough.”

 

* * * * * * * *

**_8.10 pm_**

When John’s SMS ringtone rouses him from a fitful sleep, the little burst of _Nathan Jones, you’ve been gone too long_ seems a much less clever choice than when he first chose it, and he reaches almost guiltily for his phone, groaning when he notices his bedside clock says it’s only ten past eight. His shift doesn’t start until ten, and he really could have done with another half hour in bed.

Disappointingly, the message is from Mike.

_Text: Molly told me you've surfaced again. Going to pretend I'm not offended you haven't come round to see your old mate. Anyway, you still got my copy of Surgical Pathology? Drop it off next time you’re passing? Need to check something. MS_

With another groan, John drags himself from bed, and stumbles out into the living room. He’s been meaning to return Mike’s book for ages, so he supposes - since he appears to be awake and up now, anyway - he may as well take it in on his way to work. Squinting at his bookshelves for the distinctive, thick, blue spine, he finds it wedged between Yang’s _Current Therapy in Thoracic and Cardiothoracic Surgery_ and Glasser’s _Broken Bodies, Shattered Minds_. Cheery tomes, all three of them, especially the last one. Making a mental note to invest in more frivolous reading matter in the very near future, he places Mike’s book near the front door, where he won’t forget it, and goes for a shower.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_9.05 pm_ **

Flashbacks as bad as any he’s ever had of Helmand or Kabul assail John as soon as the taxi turns into West Smithfield and, although it’s dark, it might as well be daylight, because he can _see_ Sherlock, silhouetted up there on the rooftop, alone. He can see him falling, too; see his arms and legs flailing. And then his body, broken and bleeding, on the pavement below.

Telling himself it wasn’t real doesn’t help: John’s feelings were real enough. They hurt like hell then, and they hurt like hell now, and he clutches Mike’s book tightly to his chest like a shield but, inevitably, the merciless close-ups follow: Sherlock’s hair starting to mat and cling to his skull; his blood-streaked face; his eyes, open and unseeing; and his wrist, cool and pulseless in John’s hand.

The taxi drops John off in the turning bay, just like the taxi did on that fateful day, and he retraces his footsteps - around the brick-built ambulance station, and on to the front of the pathology building. There were so many people milling about then, preventing him from getting close … 

As the same sense of breathless horror threatens to overwhelm him again, he hurries on. It didn’t happen. Sherlock didn’t die. Sherlock is safe, and well, and back in London.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_9.08pm_ **

Even at night, the corridors inside the pathology building are bright with fluorescent light. White, clean and antiseptic, they hum quietly, to the buzz of the refrigerators and computers, centrifuges and autoclaves in constant operation behind their walls. The air carries the same chemical harshness common to all hospitals but here there’s no aroma of cooking or flowers to sweeten it: here, all the patients are dead.

Some of the labs are in darkness, but John can see the lights in Mike’s blazing as soon as he pushes through the last set of double doors. He can’t stay long, but it’ll be good to see Mike again. Mike’s got the kind of solid, affable presence and dry, northern humour that seems to put everything in perspective. He’ll probably give John an earful for not having stayed in touch, but it’ll be a warm and affectionate telling off, and John will come away from it feeling much, much better. He’s already smiling in anticipation as he walks into the room.

But it’s not Mike hard at work, carefully weighing internal organs and taking meticulous notes; it’s Molly. Her eyes go wide when she sees who it is. “John! I, um …”

Equally inarticulate, John brandishes Mike’s book in explanation. “Yes. Hello. Hi. I, uh-”

They both break off, pause awkwardly, then start talking over one another, babbling in their eagerness to make the situation less tense.

“John, I really, really wanted to-”

“Molly, I was horrible to you on Sunday-”

“Sorry,” they somehow both end up saying at once. “You first.”

John smiles. “I’m sorry. For Sunday. I’d been having a bad day - but that’s no excuse for taking it out on you.”

Molly looks so relieved she might cry. “No, _I’m_ sorry. I should have tried try to find you, and let you know-”

“No,” John insists. “It’s fine. I know you were just trying to do what Sherlock asked. It was his fault, not yours.”

At the mention of Sherlock’s name, Molly lights up. “How- how is he?”

There’s a world of feeling in that hesitation, John knows, and he could kick himself for ever blaming her for any of what happened. She’s always been putty in Sherlock’s hands and Sherlock's never had any scruples about exploiting that. “He’s fine,” John assures her, though it breaks his heart to see how his words make the little frown lines between her brows relax. “Same as ever. Arrogant. Thoughtless. Impossible.”

Molly’s eyes narrow a little at this but it’s only for a second, then she turns quickly away to transfer the heart she was weighing from the scales into a disposal bucket, but as she crosses the room to wash her blue-gloved hands at the sink, John gets the distinct feeling she’s cross with him.

“Molly-?”

“It wasn’t how you think it was,” she says, not looking at him.

“How,” he asks, carefully, “do I think it was?”

“You think he had it all planned - but he didn’t. He _didn’t_ and he was scared.”

John goes cold. “Scared? Scared of what?”

“Dying.”

“Dying?” John echoes, numbly. She can’t be saying what he thinks she’s saying, surely? Greg said it was _Molly_ who was afraid.

“He was going to do it for real,” she says, using drying her hands as an excuse to continue avoiding eye contact. “Kill himself, I mean. To save you. He’d already taken something. Wrote you a note and everything.”

It’s not true. It can’t be.

“But he got his blood frozen!” John protests. “Months in advance. He told me so. What was that, if it wasn’t planning?”

Molly shakes her head. “That was when he thought he’d be able to fake his death by just disappearing for a while. Like that woman’s husband and the insurance money you blogged about.”

“Ian Monkford?”

“Yes, him. But as soon as Sherlock saw the story _The Sun_ was running, he knew just vanishing wouldn’t work. He knew Jim - _Moriarty_ wanted his death to be public. So the papers would take pictures of his body and make all the things Jim had said about him look true.”

“Oh, god.” John finds himself sagging onto a stool in shock.

“I’m just so grateful I was working late,” Molly goes on. “And that I was able to help him. Otherwise, he might’ve …” She stops, shaking her head, as if to rid it of thoughts too horrible to bear.

“God,” John breathes again, uselessly.

“He knew what Jim wanted, and what would happen if he refused. He said Jim had threatened to burn the heart out of him.” Molly looks up. “You’re his heart, John. You always have been. I wanted it to be me, but it’s you.”

John thinks he would rather be anywhere else than here, having to listen to this, right now. He can’t ever remember liking himself less. “I don’t deserve to be.”

But Molly is suddenly brisk. “Yes, you _do_. You’re perfect for him. And don’t feel guilty about me, because I’ve got Greg now, and it would never have worked with Sherlock anyway. He’s too …” She hesitates, trying to find the right word.

“Sherlock?” John supplies, in a feeble attempt at a joke.

Molly smiles at him. “Yes. Exactly. Too Sherlock. Being with him … it would be like trying to stand upright in a hurricane, wouldn’t it?”

“It would,” John nods. “ _Is_.”

“But you’re stronger than me. You can handle it.”

John hangs his head. “Haven’t handled it very well recently,” he mutters. “I’ve been an idiot.”

She lays a comforting hand on his arm. “Don’t be too hard on yourself,” she says softly. “We all do silly things, don’t we? When we’re in love.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

He may not have managed to escape ( _yet_ ), but Sherlock has four - no _five_ \- theories about what’s going on. Top of his list is that his imprisonment is one of Mycroft’s little games, designed to remind him where the real power in the Holmes family lies (though probably actioned through what Mycroft fondly imagines the best of intentions). It’s a good theory, and not without supporting evidence, given how Mycroft’s been trying to run Sherlock’s life more closely than ever for the past year. On the other hand, it’s impossible to discount how oddly kind Mycroft’s been of late, how genuinely eager he’s been to help repair things with John …

The next most likely explanation is that it’s someone settling a score. Over the past decade, Sherlock has had a hand in putting scores of London’s more serious villains behind bars and some of them are bound to be holding a grudge.

Equally, it could be an up-and-coming gangland boss, eager to impress his rivals with a _coup_ like capturing (and probably killing) the famous consulting detective, Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock nods approvingly. He’s earned something of a name for himself, it’s true: his scalp would make an awe-inspiring trophy.

Then there are the professional law-enforcers with an axe to grind - all the ones Sherlock has, in John’s charming words, made ‘feel like a tit’ over the years. Sherlock could reel off a list of a dozen likely suspects without even thinking.

The final possibility - and it makes Sherlock’s skin crawl to even think it - is that it’s a ‘fan’. Either type would be tedious, but at least the psychotic, murdering variety would want no more physical contact than that required to kill him. The other kind ...

(What time is it?)

The air is cooler now, bordering on cold, the passing traffic even less frequent and the seagulls have stopped calling. (It must be night.) Sherlock sighs heavily, wishing he were bored enough to sleep.

Time passes, and nothing happens. More time passes, and still nothing happens. Then at last, out of the nothing, comes a sound. (A car. No, _two_ cars - separated by no more than a few yards.) Sherlock hears the tone of their engines change as first one, then the other, turn towards the building, and stop.

Adrenalin begins to course through his body and his heart-rate picks up. (This is it.) Despite knowing it’s useless, he starts fighting his bonds again, the rattle and scrape of the handcuffs against the chair echoing the sound of the lock on the warehouse door being unchained and opened.

Two men (the length of stride and rhythm of footfall indicate both newcomers are male) make their way towards him in silence (briskly) (almost marching) (picking up their feet and planting them solidly) but once they’re close enough, the body odour emanating from one of them is as familiar as a spoken greeting.

“Joining me again so soon?” Sherlock taunts.

Without warning, a hand grabs him by the shoulder, pulling him back hard, as the bag is snatched from his head. After not being able to see for so long, the light is everywhere, and dazzling but, after he’s blinked a few times, he realizes it’s actually coming from a single, portable lamp (brass, with a handle). He watches as it’s placed on something that looks like a medical trolley, then a hefty man clad in black, face hidden by a knitted balaclava, wheels the trolley closer.

In the golden glow from the lamp Sherlock catches a chilling glimpse of scalpels and nails, pliers and secateurs, then the second man, who’s standing out of sight behind him, speaks.

“I have no wish to hurt you, Mr Holmes.” He has a nicely modulated voice, well-educated and deep. He pauses, then adds - and Sherlock can _hear_ him smiling at his own joke, “Which is why I’m not alone.”

“Who are you?” Sherlock demands.

“You could say I’m a friend of a friend,” comes the reply. “Or the friend of an enemy. Or even the enemy of an enemy. All would, in some respect, be true.”

Sherlock huffs in disdain. “Riddles. Boring.”

“ _Evidence_ ,” the voice corrects. “I’m disappointed. I haven’t given you much, I know, but I’d thought you’d deduce _something_ from it.”

“Apart from the fact you have a somewhat curious definition of friendship? And that you will use anyone to serve your ends.”

The voice chuckles, admiringly. “Excellent. What else?”

(Distinctive _d_ and _t_ sounds, made by curling the tip of the tongue under the alveolar ridge.) (You’ve spent a lot of time in an Urdu-speaking country - Pakistan or India.) (The tiger hunter!) (The man who _shot Mrs Hudson_ ). Murderous rage grips Sherlock at the thought (if that CIA man thought he had a hard time, he should see what I’m going to do to this man) but he quickly realizes it will do him no good at present, so he breathes through it and turns his mind back to the accumulation of data. (This man’s vowels are clipped, his accent RP.) (Upper class background, probably - or he feels the need to feign one.) (He’s held at least one position of authority.) (But his lower vocal range is failing, and his breaths to words ratio high.) (He’s old. Seventy-plus.)

“No idea,” Sherlock lies.

“Oh, come now. You’re too modest.”

Sherlock snorts. “I’m really not.”

“All right, Mr Holmes. The time for pleasantries is over … Carey.”

“Yes, Colonel?”

(Colonel! _Army_! Of _course_.) (The walk, the voice, the air of command.)

“Hit him. And Carey-”

“Yes, Colonel?”

“There’s no need to hold back.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_Friday, April 19th - 4.25 am_ **

Incredibly, the only injuries sustained by the teenage girl on the exam table in front of John are a touch of whiplash and a cut to the forehead. He treats her with analgesics and anti-inflammatories, closes the wound with a couple of plastic stitches, and tells her she’s well enough go home.

She was lucky: the condition of the other people involved in the pile-up was far more serious. It’s been a hectic night, and John’s still only six and a half hours into a ten-hour shift. Exhausted, he peels off his surgical gloves and drops them into the bin, hoping for a few minutes’ respite, but quickly snaps on a new pair when the triage nurse tells him he’s wanted in Room 9.

He finds the door open, but the screen around the exam table has been drawn, shielding the room’s occupant from view. He hurries in, fearing the worst.

He finds it: behind the curtain and immaculately dressed, stands Mycroft, poker-straight, a deep frown lining his brow.

“Mycroft?” Anxiety starts to gnaw at John’s gut. Mycroft turning up out of the blue at - John checks the clock on the wall behind him - _4.25 am_ can mean nothing but trouble. “What is it?” he asks. “What’s wrong?”

Mycroft takes a little too long in answering. “Nothing for you to concern yourself about.”

“So there _is_ something,” John cries. “Is it Sherlock? Is he all right?”

Mycroft gives him a rapid on-off smile, one that doesn’t reach his eyes. “There’s no need for _you_ to worry. I have the matter in hand.”

“Oddly enough,” John replies, wanting to punch him for being so damn unforthcoming, “that doesn’t exactly reassure me. So what’s happened? Did you get him into trouble again?”

Mycroft’s eyes flash dangerously. “My little brother is, as I’m sure you’re well aware, perfectly capable of getting into trouble all on his own,” he spits back. “He will persist in letting his heart rule his head these days.”

The accusation - that it’s John’s fault - may not be explicit but it’s there. Mycroft might as well have painted it bright red and added flashing lights. It doesn’t help that John was already feeling guilty about how he’s treated Sherlock, and he wilts a little under Mycroft’s hostile gaze. “What do you want me to do?” he asks meekly.

“I want you to do nothing. _Nothing_ , d’you hear me? I want you to stay at home and leave finding him to me.”

“ _Finding him_?” John gasps. “You mean he’s missing?”

Mycroft makes an impatient noise, as if annoyed with himself for having given too much away. He nods, once. “Since last night. And before you remind me of his tendency to disappear for days on end, I happen to know he went to meet … a friend.”

A ‘friend’? Sherlock has always insisted John is his only friend. John swallows. “He was coming to see me?”

Mycroft smiles again, coldly. “He certainly thought so.”

“How can I help?” John pleads. “I want to help. Let me help, Mycroft. Anything. Just point me in the right direction. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

For the first time since John walked into the room, Mycroft’s expression softens slightly but he shakes his head. “The best thing you can do, John, is to keep yourself out of harm’s way. Sherlock would never forgive me were anything to happen to you.”

“Is that likely?” John demands, not knowing whether to be touched or infuriated that both Holmes brothers seem to want to wrap him in cotton wool. He’s a soldier, for god’s sake. He’s used to action, and pretty hardened to violence too. He’s not made of glass.

“Well, one can never be sure, can one?” Mycroft replies. “So promise me something, hmm? For Sherlock’s sake, as well as your own, steer clear of 221B.”

Knowing that Sherlock isn’t living there, returning to 221B hadn’t even crossed John’s mind. Until now.

“Of course,” he vows.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

This time, Carey’s fist strikes the side of Sherlock’s face. (Just below the cheekbone, slightly above the lower jaw). (The man has a solid, accurate punch.) The pain is so bruising, it makes Sherlock’s eyes water and his eardrum ring but, even so, he finds himself hiding a smile. Gratitude is not something he ever expected to feel towards Mark Woodley, of all people (the man made some very unsavoury threats against John - for which he will _never_ be forgiven) and yet, at this precise moment, he’s feeling very grateful to him indeed. Thanks to the beating he suffered at the hands of Woodley’s hired thugs in _Eden_ (what is it? eleven years ago now?), he knows a punch can hurt like hell without necessarily doing serious damage, and that arms can be twisted through seemingly impossible angles without breaking. Better still, he knows that even an agonizingly deep knife wound won’t inevitably result in death. He couldn’t claim to be comfortable at this point, or unhurt, but he’s certainly not in fear of his life (the Colonel’s ‘no need to hold back’ was merely for effect: Carey’s remit is to soften me up, not kill me), and so he yawns ostentatiously, and heaves a heavy, bored sigh.

It earns him a another backhand crack across the mouth.

“I presume there’s some purpose to all this?” he drawls, once the pain subsides, deliberately ignoring the fact he can taste blood. “Or is there just nothing on telly tonight?”

“Not much of a one for the box, meself,” Carey confides with a chuckle, dealing Sherlock another punch - this time to the upper part of his chest, where his shirt buttons open and his skin is exposed. “Prefer to make me own entertainment.”

“Then you clearly have a very dull mind,” Sherlock observes. “You’ve been doing the same thing for - what? an _hour_ now? - and yet you call it ‘entertainment’.”

It’s not the cleverest remark Sherlock’s ever made, but it prompts Carey’s employer to finally break his silence. “I take it you’re ready to move things on a little, then, Mr Holmes?”

“A little. A lot. Either.” Despite the handcuffs, Sherlock attempts a nonchalant shrug. “ _Something_. Before I die of boredom.”

“All right. Let’s take a little walk down memory lane, shall we? I’m sure you remember Irene Adler?”

“Vaguely.”

“Well, I want what she wanted.”

“You want to be my girlfriend?”

The Colonel laughs, sounding genuinely amused. “Surely _that_ position belongs to a certain Doctor Watson? Although perhaps things have changed? I did notice, the last time I spoke with him, that he sounded less than rapturous about you.”

(He’s spoken to John? How? Where? When?) (He’s spoken to _John_!) Fear greater than any Carey’s managed to evoke seizes Sherlock by the throat. “If you touch him-” (Oh, _brilliant_. Let the criminal mastermind know John is your Achilles’ heel. Absolute _genius_!) Sherlock quickly clamps his mouth shut.

“There would be nothing you could do about it,” the Colonel tells him, stating the painfully obvious. “Luckily for you, I’m not interested in harming him. In fact, I’m not interested in Captain Watson at all.”

“Then what _are_ you interested in?”

“I told you: the same thing as Irene Adler. Immunity from prosecution. Protection from an old friend’s friends. Plus a little something to see me through what I hope will be a long and uneventful retirement.”

“Can’t help you.”

“Oh, but you _can_ ,” the Colonel insists. “Not directly, perhaps - but indirectly. If, for example, you were to speak to your brother.”

The words seem to be a cue of some kind because Carey wipes his blood-spattered hands clean on his trousers, and bends down to take something from the bottom shelf of the trolley. It’s a camera (a Canon EOS 600D + EF-S) (18-55 mm IS II Lens). (Expensive.) He flips open the screen display and points the lens at Sherlock.

(Of course! The punching, all the little cuts and bruises - they were for _this_. They want to film a video appeal!)

“You want me to plead your case for you?” Sherlock scoffs.

“I was thinking more of you pleading for Mycroft Holmes’ help in saving your life-”

“Oh, _please_!” Sherlock interrupts with a snort. “You’re not going to kill me.”

“Am I not?”

“No, you’re not. You’re not even going to get your trained gorilla to do it. How do I know? I’ll tell you: if you’d meant to kill me, Carey here wouldn’t have been half so careful not to slice through an artery, or rupture one of my internal organs. It _could_ be that’s he’s new at this, or incompetent, but you’re a man used to ordering men into battle - you’re used to professionalism. You wouldn’t handicap yourself by bringing someone inexperienced, or useless, on a job like this. Ergo, he’s obeying very specific orders.” Warming to his theme now, Sherlock finds himself speaking faster, rattling off his deductions not just because it’s what he does, but because he wants to _win_. “You don’t want me dead because you’re not a man who kills to get what he wants. You’ve specifically ruled out harming John Watson, even though you suspect my association with him goes beyond that of mere colleagues or friends. And you want immunity from prosecution. Not something my brother is likely to grant you over my dead body.”

There’s a long pause, then the Colonel huffs out an admiring breath. “I’d heard you were good-”

“Child’s play!” Sherlock interrupts, impatient now. “You really haven’t thought this through, have you? That’s the trouble with most of the criminal classes - no imagination. Try thinking ahead. Try _thinking_. Let’s say I agree to plead prettily on your video for you, and that Mycroft agrees to your demands - what then? Mycroft has you arrested the minute you release me. So why don’t you do the intelligent thing and let me go now to save yourself the embarrassment?”

“I’d heard you were good,” the Colonel says again, but there’s no admiration in his tone this time, just disappointment. “Think, Mr Holmes - think!”

Being wrong-footed is not something Sherlock appreciates. “Now you’re starting to _sound_ like Irene Adler,” he mutters, irritated - but suddenly the comparison makes perfect sense. “Ah - you want to _trade_. Freedom and a retirement fund - in exchange, not for me, but for information.”

There’s a muted sound of clapping. (The Colonel is wearing gloves.) (Well, he would. He said it himself: he likes to keep his hands clean.) “Good. And?”

“You’ll give Mycroft some of it,” Sherlock replies wearily, (because - God - it’s hardly original, is it?) “but not all. Just enough to whet his appetite.”

“There you are!” the Colonel chuckles. (Patronizing git.) “I knew you’d get there in the end. Your job is to make the introductions, to get me an invitation to the party. I’ll do the rest. Now, let’s see you pull your most terrified face for the camera.”

“Let’s see _you_ piss off.”

The Colonel inhales noisily. (He’s preparing himself to let rip with a torrent of threats and abuse.) (One point to me.) But, almost immediately, he has himself under control again. (A point to him.) “All right, Carey,” he says evenly, although there’s a sharp precision to his words now (he’s angry - that’s another point to me), “forget the video. Cut off a handful of his hair. Mycroft Holmes will certainly have it DNA-tested, but let’s not underestimate the shock value of discovering a recognizable lock of one’s brother’s hair in the morning post.”

Obediently, Carey snatches a handful of hair at Sherlock’s temple, his scalpel blade glinting perilously close to Sherlock’s eye. “Like this?”

“Too short,” the Colonel tells him. “And not curly enough. Try at the back.”

Still gripping the hair he’s already seized, Carey yanks Sherlock’s head forward and down, pressing a hefty elbow to the crown to keep it there. Sherlock’s stomach contracts. He feels sick. Can’t breathe. In all his life, his head’s only been forced down once …

“Get on with it!” Sherlock hisses, horrified at how weak with fear he’s suddenly feeling. (It’s this place. The smell of it.)

Carey laughs unpleasantly. “Listen to ‘im! I’ve ‘eard blokes plead to be put out of their misery before, but never over their _hair_. Bloody poof!”

“Oh, I don’t think it’s his _hair_ he’s worried about,” the Colonel says quietly. “Put the knife down, Carey - and give Pike a call instead. If Mr Holmes won’t plead for his brother’s help - well, let’s remember a picture paints a thousand words. And a _moving_ picture a thousand more. Now, set that camera up on a tripod, and see if you can’t improve the lighting. I want nice, clear images. And sound. I have a feeling we might yet hear the great Sherlock Holmes plead.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_8.45 am_ **

Hoping to God that Mycroft’s concern for Sherlock will mean there’s less chance of public telephone boxes clamouring for his attention, or of CCTV cameras swivelling around like eyes on stalks to follow his every step, John hurries along Baker Street. To his great relief, there’s no obvious police presence outside 221B, and no More-Than-My-Job’s-Worth constable to stop him putting his key in the lock.

The front door shuts behind him with its familiar old thud and, despite everything, John feels a rush of warmth at being _home_. He glances up the staircase, oddly touched by the worn paint on its treads, and it’s all too easy to picture Sherlock at the top of it, holding John’s gaze as, already tingling with desire, John climbs the stairs to join him. The need to see him again - to hold him - is almost painful, and John takes the stairs at a run.

Once inside the flat, he’s not even sure what he’s looking for - something, _anything_ , that might help rescue Sherlock and bring him back - _here_ , where he belongs. And then it comes to him: his gun! He rushes up the second flight of stairs, to his own room, heart pounding. It’s probably too much to hope that the police won’t have found it and taken it: Mrs Hudson was _shot_ , after all. If nothing else, it’ll have been examined to rule it out of the investigation.

He throws open his old bedroom door and darts over to the chest of drawers, yanking the top one open more out of desperation than hope. And yet - incredibly - here it is, his Browning L9A1. He picks it up, hand curling automatically around the grip, the tip of his forefinger finding the trigger of its own volition. It’s so natural, so instinctive, that for the umpteenth time, John’s grateful he decided not to take it from the flat along with the rest of his belongings. It would have been too easy, in the depths of his despair … He checks the magazine. Fifteen cartridges left. He tucks the pistol into the inside pocket of his jacket, resolute. He’s already killed one man in Sherlock’s defence, and he’ll kill another if he has to. 

Running down the stairs again, he’s horrified to hear the door to the street opening. So near, and yet so far! He can’t be arrested now; he just _can’t_. To his shocked amazement, he’s actually contemplating knocking a policeman out cold if he gets the chance, when Mrs Hudson comes into view in the hallway below, carrying a small case with her good arm.

“Mrs Hudson?”

She looks up, eyes widening with surprise at finding she’s not alone in the house, but when she realizes who it is, she smiles. “John!”

John runs lightly down the rest of the stairs. “You’re home!” he cries, embracing her carefully. “When were you discharged?”

“Twenty minutes ago,” she says, brandishing her case.

John can almost hear Sherlock’s snort of derision. _You see, John - but you don’t observe._

“You should have called me,” he says, taking it from her. “I’d’ve been happy to come and pick you up.”

“I know,” she nods. “But I didn’t like to bother you, not when you’re working. Besides - I had other arrangements.”

“Someone else brought you home?”

The little lines around Mrs Hudson’s lips deepen as she purses them. “Someone else was _supposed_ to,” she sniffs. “My friend Sebastian. He’s been so attentive for months, and he visited every day in hospital. He said he’d be there whenever I needed him, but I haven’t seen him since Monday and now he isn’t even answering his phone. It’s like he’s vanished into thin air!”

 _Monday_.

All of a sudden, John feels apprehensive. “I came to see you on Monday,” he says slowly.

Mrs Hudson frowns at him. “Yes, dear,” she agrees - though she’s clearly not made the connection John’s mind has leapt to, because she’s using the same careful, gentle tone she always used when Sherlock was at his most incomprehensible, “you did. But I don’t think-”

“We talked about Sherlock. About him being back.”

“Yes. But-”

“Mrs Hudson. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important, but I need you to give me his number.”

“Sherlock’s?”

“No. Sebastian’s.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Carey reaches over Sherlock’s head to strike a match off the pillar his chair’s secured to. “I bet you’re wondering, eh?” he remarks, lighting a cigarette. “What he’s like. Pike.”

“No.” (He’s a monster.) (All hands, and hot breath, and bulging trousers.) (No sense of decency. No pity, no compassion.) (He’s tall and fair. Smells of sun lotion, sand. He has a nice smile and his lips are perfect. He-)

Sherlock determinedly arrests his careening train of thought by taking a deep breath, only for the faint tang of tobacco it carries to torment him still further. He’s desperate for a cigarette, but he’s not going to plead. (Not now.) (Not again.) (Not _ever_ again.)

Carey sucks on his cigarette pensively, exhaling the smoke into Sherlock’s face. “So, you ain’t curious what he’s gonna do to you?”

“Not in the least.” (I already know.) (He’s going to lure me into the shadows. Ask me if I want to play. Touch me, violate me, tell me he knows I want it really-) Sherlock’s heart starts thudding again and bile rises in his throat.

Carey doesn’t even seem to notice. “You don’t want me to tell you why the Colonel decided to take off like that?” he goes on, conversationally.

“Why should I?” (The Colonel left because, despite the kidnapping, despite _shooting Mrs Hudson_ , there are some things he _can’t_ stomach. He’s a soldier - physical violence doesn’t bother him - therefore Pike obviously represents something worse.)

For all his defiance, for all he’s trying not to, Sherlock realizes he’s shaking. (Not afraid, not afraid.) (This is _not_ fear.) (It’s … something else.) (Anger - yes, it’s _anger_.) (Should have known that message wasn’t from John. It was stupid - _stupid_ \- to hope otherwise.) Sherlock knows he can’t escape - not by himself, not even _afterwards_. Not without help. (Oh god. Another rescue.) He has a sudden vision of the eighteen-year old Mycroft, fat and red-faced, racing down the beach again, and the sense of shame is unbearable. Clenching his fists, he tries willing his knees to stop visibly trembling. It doesn’t work.

Watching him, Carey sighs. “Wanna fag?” he says, holding one out. “You look like you need one.”

(The gesture is a sympathetic one.) (Carey doesn’t like Pike. Doesn’t like what he does.)

“ _Or_ you could let me go.”

Carey sucks his teeth, grimacing. “Nah. Couldn’t do that.”

“Why not?” (Why not? Why _not_!)

“Cuz I don’t want the Colonel setting Pike on me, that’s why. Least _you’re_ used to that kind of thing.”

“ _Used_ to it!” Sherlock snaps, before he can stop himself. (Who the hell ever gets _used_ to it?) (How much of an idiot _is_ this man?) (You don’t get used to it. You don’t ‘get over’ it. All you do is find a way to live with it.)

“Well, it’s not like you ain’t ever … you know … is it?”

(Oh! He meant-)

“An’ the good news,” Carey goes on, puffing on his cigarette, “is he ain’t gonna kill you. Pike ain’t got the balls for that. Now, d’you want this fag or not?”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_9.45am_ **  


John looks tired, worried, every line in his forty-year old face deep and wretched.

He knows, because he can see his reflection in the mirror on the wall opposite. Why do cafés think mirrors are a good idea? Seeing himself looking so grim would have been enough to put him off his food, if he’d ordered any.

His coffee mug is empty now but he’s still hanging onto it like a lifeline, letting the residual warmth seep into his knuckles where they touch the brilliant white glaze. Why is Mary taking so long? He lifts his phone from the table top and taps the screen to wake it up again, but it remains stubbornly blank and uncommunicative.

“Another coffee?” Mr Chatterjee suggests from behind the counter where he’s filling the display cabinet with rolls and sandwiches. “On the house.”

John hesitates. He doesn’t want to think he’ll have enough time to drink it: every minute that passes is another minute in which anything could be happening to Sherlock. On the other hand, where else is he going to go? Not back home to bed, that’s for sure - there’s no way he’ll be able to sleep until he knows Sherlock’s safe - and not back to 221B either. Being there without him would be like giving in.

“Uh, yeah. Thanks.”

But as Mr Chatterjee brings a fresh mug over, John’s phone at last decides to ring - and it’s Mary. He snatches it up, pulling an apologetic face as he jumps up from him seat and raising his free hand in a Sorry-Have-To-Dash kind of way as he makes quickly for the door.

“Mary?” Standing on the pavement outside Speedy’s, his voice sounds breathless, even to his own ears. He’s trying to stay realistic but praying for a miracle anyway. “Did you get anything?”

“I did. The SIM card is transmitting from a place in Kent.”

“Kent?” John feels his heart sink. He was hoping Mary would say it was somewhere in London. Getting to Kent could take _hours_. A couple of office workers standing smoking a few yards away give him a funny look and he realizes he must have gasped the word. He lowers his voice. “Kent? Whereabouts in Kent?”

“A little place called Allhallowsfield.”

“Never heard of it.”

“It’s a bit off the beaten track. Near the coast.”

“No train station then?”

“No. Sorry.”

John pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Bugger.” This is going to mean the Tube, and buses, and walking - all of it taking _time_.

“John ..?”

“What?” It comes out more ungraciously than he intended.

“Look, this is obviously important. Would you like me to drive you there?”

“What? Oh god, yes! Please!” He’s so relieved that he forgets to keep his voice down and the smokers cast him another funny look. He grins at them sheepishly but they stare back, unsmiling. As they turn away, it dawns on him - a bit belatedly - that Mary is a police officer. A sergeant. He clears his throat. “Listen, Mary, this might not be strictly legal. I might, uh, need to get into places ...”

Her laugh is warm and throaty. “I thought as much.”

“You did?”

“Well, it’s what you and Sherlock do, isn’t it? The not strictly legal stuff.”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“John,” she says, leaning on the word as if he’s being horribly slow on the uptake. “I _like_ you. You’re a good man. You wouldn’t involve me in anything that might threaten my career, would you?”

John has an unregistered firearm in his pocket. ‘Borrowed’ from the British Army. And if Sherlock’s life is at risk, he’ll use it.

“No,” he says firmly. “Wouldn’t dream of it. Absolutely not.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With beta thanks to verilyvexed.


	6. Recovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John and Mary set out to rescue Sherlock from Moran, but will they arrive in time? 
> 
>  
> 
> **Chapter may contain triggers**

**_Friday, April 19th - 10.40 am_ **

 

 

Mary’s car is a 61 reg Volkswagen estate of some kind. Navy blue, with leather seats. Beyond that, John really couldn’t say: never having learnt to drive, model numbers and engine sizes mean nothing to him, and anyway, all he cares about is that it’ll go fast enough and won’t break down. But even he can see that Mary’s car suits her: quiet, confident and understated on the outside; lived-in and cosy on the inside, warm with the smell of coffee and fast food.

Mary is someone who often has to eat on the go, during snatched moments on stakeouts, or at crime scenes, John finds himself thinking. Which is just the kind of thing Sherlock would be thinking too, he realizes, only Sherlock would probably be identifying the exact brand of fast food and the precise roast of the coffee as well. _Oh god_. He wishes Sherlock were here, sneering at his inability to observe what’s right under his nose, and suddenly needing to feel worthy of him, John looks around Mary’s car more closely, trying to deduce something new about this woman who’s somehow become a friend.

Almost immediately, Mary hastily sweeps a few crisp crumbs off the dashboard and onto the carpet at John’s feet. “Didn’t have time for breakfast,” she says, sheepishly. “Oh god, you think I’m a slob now, don’t you? Or worse. One of those people who never eats properly. I do. Only … not often,” she admits, with a sigh of defeat. “There. Now you know. But it always seems like such a faff when it’s just for one, doesn’t it?”

John nods. It does. Has done. Though right now, he’s praying all that will change soon.

They drive on in silence, Mary concentrating on the road, and John trying to silence the voices in his head telling him he may yet be too late. Road signs and gantries slip past. A gaggle of kids in school uniform trails crocodile-style across a footbridge overhead, and Mary manages to avoid hitting an elderly cyclist who suddenly wobbles into their path. They descend into an underpass, and come out again.

“So you’ve forgiven him, then?”

The unexpectedness of the question makes John start. They’re passing through the bleak southbound entrance to the Blackwall Tunnel now and, as Mary flicks on her headlights, its curved walls glow a dull, sickly yellow, and seem to close in.

“Sorry-?”

Mary casts him a smiling, sideways glance. “Sherlock. You’ve forgiven him.”

“I-uh …” John has no idea what to say. ‘Yes’ sounds too arrogant - as if he still thinks there’s anything to forgive Sherlock for - but a lengthy explanation would make him sound like an idiot.

“You wouldn’t be back working with him if you hadn’t, would you?” Mary goes on, eyes fixed on the rather erratic progress of the white van in front of them. “I’m glad.”

Again, John doesn’t know what to say. The best he can manage is to clear his throat, and mumble, “Um … are you?”

The van stutters temporarily to a halt, forcing Mary to apply the brakes and change gear, and John’s seatbelt tightens across his chest.

“Of course, I am,” Mary tells him, as the van takes off again, belching black smoke from its exhaust. “I told you: I like you.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

It’s been so long (an hour, minimum) since Carey’s phone call summoning Pike that Sherlock’s beginning to think the man doesn’t actually exist, and that this is another of the Colonel’s mind games, with no more serious threat behind it than the cuts and bruises Carey inflicted.

(Consider the data: after some desultory fiddling with his camera, and plugging a floor lamp - Ikea, Aröd model, adjustable arm and head - into an extension cable, Carey flopped down on the floor, back propped up against one of the pillars, and promptly fell asleep.) (Hardly the behaviour of a man about to film another man’s rape.)

(Or is it?) (Perhaps Carey’s used to it. Perhaps it’s part of the job on a regular basis. Perhaps he’s as thoroughly densensitized to sexual abuse as he is to physical violence.) (Besides, look at him. Hardly a man in top form. The size of his waist and the flabbiness of his thighs suggest the punching session was more exercise than he’s had in a very long time.) (Plus, he’s been up all night.) (His being asleep doesn’t necessarily indicate he’s relaxed; he could simply be worn out.)

The sinking feeling this thought causes warns Sherlock he’s giving into emotion - hope, then disappointment, in rapid succession. (Stop it.) (Think.) (Gather more data.)

(Dissociate.)

(Camera angle: directed towards the victim’s chair. The light too.) (They don’t intend to move him much.) (Then where ..?) (Of course! The _pillar_.) (They’ll cuff his wrists around it. And his ankles.) (The logical order is to release him from the chair first, get him upright, strip him, cuff his arms, then bind his ankles.) (Five links in the chain. Each one a potential weak spot …)

Sherlock’s mind starts whirring, shuffling possibilities like cards: Carey kneeling in front of him to open the cuffs around his ankles, perfectly positioned for a solid kick to the teeth; himself standing, whirling around, using the chair as a weapon - or making a grab for something from that handy assortment of sharp instruments just lying there, waiting, on the trolley; twisting his forearm free of the hand trying to restrain it, capturing his assailant’s wrist instead and yanking the bastard’s arm painfully up his back.

(But there will be _two_ of them, so-)

A sudden, loud snore from Carey startles Sherlock away from the cool safety of his intellectual puzzle and back into his chilled and vulnerable body and, before he can stop it, fear slams into him hard again. Stomach contracting, throat tightening, he holds his breath, studying Carey for signs of wakefulness, but after another loud snore, and a series of adenoidal snuffles, Carey settles again and falls quiet.

(Carey is a weak spot.) ( _The_ weak spot: he’s tired and he doesn’t like Pike.) (A well chosen remark could set them against each other, particularly something implying poorly hidden attraction or secret fantasies.)

(Yes, all right - there will be two of them, but the victim’s survived much worse odds before. Besides, whatever happens, he’s not going down without a fight.)

(He’s not eleven any more.)

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_11.05am_ **

 

With its neat, whitewashed houses and orderly gardens, Kent is incongruously - _unsympathetically_ \- pretty. John couldn’t give a rat’s arse about pretty. He’s not exactly in the mood for appreciating the scenery and if Mary’s doesn’t ignore a speed limit soon, he’s going to snatch the steering wheel from her hands and try driving himself.

“Don’t suppose this thing has a flashing light?” he mutters when, yet again, she changes down a gear. “A siren?”

She gives a little snort of amusement. “Have you got any idea what the penalties are for blue-lighting it without good cause? Besides, I’m supposed to set a good example. I’m a _sergeant_ , remember?”

John clenches his jaw, yearning for his days as a captain, when he’d have been able to order a mere sergeant to put their sodding foot down. Rescuing Sherlock _is_ a good cause. The best.

Mary must have seen him quietly fuming in frustration, because the next thing he knows, she's giving his knee a reassuring little pat. “Don’t worry. It’s not far now.”

But John isn’t reassured. He’s worried, bordering on terrified. What the hell has happened to Sherlock? Is he even alive? He stares out gloomily at the endless fields surrounding them, sure that trying to find him is going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack, or a life-raft with no beacon lost on the ocean.

“You all right?” Mary asks, glancing across at him as she brakes into a bend.

“Me?” John asks, trying but failing to hide his impatience. “Fine. Absolutely fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Mary shakes her head. “You’re a terrible liar, John Watson. You’ve been twitchy ever since I picked you up - and now you’re worrying me. What’s going on? What are we doing this far out of London?”

For a moment, John debates whether to tell her. “It’s Sherlock,” he says at last. “I think he might need me.”

“You _think_?” Mary raises an eyebrow. “You _think_ he might need you, so you drop everything and go rushing half-way across the country after him? I thought this was an urgent case! Weren’t you working last night?”

The way she says it, it sounds foolish. John only wishes it were. He supposes he’d better tell her the whole story. She’s going to find out soon enough anyway. “Yes, I was, but there’s a bit more to it than-”

“You’re a good friend,” she interrupts. “A very good friend.” She pauses, and her expression hardens a little. “Especially after how he treated you. I hope he appreciates it.”

“He’s gone missing,” John blurts out, because he can’t bear her to get Sherlock so wrong, not when he knows her poor opinion of him is all his fault. Besides, it’s a relief to be able to say it out loud. “He’s gone missing and I’m worried.”

Out of the corner of his eye, John sees Mary turn her gaze towards him. “Missing?”

Not trusting himself to look at her, John stares out of the windscreen and nods. “Not even Mycroft knows where he is. Which means he’s probably in danger. A _lot_ of danger.”

“We should tell the Guv. Now.”

John could kick himself. _Of course_ that would be her response. “Then what?” he snaps, because he’s not an idiot: he’s considered that option. “He takes over? He calls in the local police? It all takes _time_ , Mary. I can’t wait around for search warrants. I have to do something _now_.”

“I think you’d better tell me what you know,” Mary says, with a small sigh. “All of it.”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Right up until the moment an uneven chugging announced the arrival outside of a motorbike (V-twin engine, poorly tuned, 999 cc), prompting Carey to stir himself from his slumbers, Sherlock’s situation seemed perfectly clear to him: he was the innocent victim in all this, a lamb to the proverbial, about to be violated in the most disgusting way possible because some ruthless old bastard has decided it's the best way to persuade Mycroft to make his criminal record disappear.

Now, however, he’s not so sure. (Only an idiot would have been duped into thinking John had changed his mind so suddenly and completely after taking what was clearly such a painful decision for him.) In fact, Sherlock’s beginning to wonder if, underneath his logic and detachment, he has some kind of death wish - a desperate need to be bested, to be _beaten_ as comprehensively as, in the end, he beat Moriarty. (That’s the tragedy of genius: you’re always standing on a rooftop, alone. Always waiting to fall.) (Sometimes it’s all you can think about.)

Perhaps - the thought flashes into Sherlock’s mind like viciously bright sunlight - perhaps that’s what happened on the beach. Perhaps he wasn’t such an innocent then, after all. Perhaps he _engineered_ it. With Mummy increasingly turning to the bottle, and Father more and more absent, perhaps he was longing for someone to look up to, to be scared of - someone to stand between him and the void, to stop him feeling so dangerously out of control. (Mycroft didn’t count.) (The man on the beach was hardly a random stranger: he was tall, and handsome, and strong - like one of those Greek gods in Mummy’s art books.) Perhaps Sherlock chose him, even at that age, even when he didn’t know what he was choosing. (Did I choose this too? There are schools of thought which would argue-)

At Sherlock’s back, the door rumbles slowly closed, its metal edge meeting the metal wall with a final, loud bang that reverberates through the whole building, and the bolts are driven determinedly home. Carey and Pike are approaching - Sherlock can’t see them, but they’re talking, in low mutters, Carey’s voice deep like gravel, Pike’s strained and thin. All of a sudden, Sherlock finds himself wondering what Pike looks like, trying to put flesh on the bare, monstrous bones in his head. Because Pike might be as much a victim in this as Sherlock. (He might be _more_ of one. He could be young, and scared, and terrified of being caught.)

(Or - psychologically more likely - he’s just a pervert who enjoys it. Enjoys the power of making another man writhe and squirm.) A prospect far worse than any he’s imagined so far, hits Sherlock hard. What if, however hard he tries not to, he gets aroused? (What if - oh god - what if Pike is anything like John?)

“Yeah, yeah - let the dog see the rabbit, then,” Pike cackles, interrupting Carey mid-sentence. “Gotta get meself in the mood, ’aven’t I?”

A hand grabs Sherlock’s head from behind, fingers tight in his hair to stop him from jerking it away, and then there’s a face, right in front of his, as Pike stoops down to look at him.

Relief, sweet and utter, washes over Sherlock. Pike’s face is long and thin, framed by lank, dark hair in serious need of a wash. His lips are thick, his nose lumpy and misshapen, and his pock-marked skin a curious yellow-grey. (Long term smoker and substance abuser.) A man less like John would be impossible to find.

They hold each other’s gaze for a bit, sizing each other up, then Pike’s ugly mouth splits into an even uglier grin, revealing stained teeth and receding gums. “Fuck a duck!” he laughs, releasing Sherlock’s head with a rough shove as he turns back to Carey. “I’d’ve done this ’un for free!”

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_11.35 am_ **

 

Mary is frowning as she pulls out to overtake yet another a painfully slow tractor. “John,” she says, leaning on his name, as though that in itself might convince him to agree with her, “if you’re right about Moran - if he’s really got Sherlock - it’s very likely he was involved in the Hudson shooting too. Which makes _this_ part of the Guv’s case. I’ve got to call the him.”

“Not yet,” John pleads. “Give me an hour, that’s all -” He stops abruptly. There’s a road sign up ahead - _Allhallowsfield_ \- and his pulse jumps at the sight of it, overwhelmed by the same kind of agitating rush of excitement and nausea he used to get in Afghanistan at the sound of helicopters bringing casualties in. “ _Please_ , Mary.”

He half-thinks she’s going to refuse but instead, she sighs. “All right. You win. But I’m reporting in the minute we know anything.”

John nods. “Fair enough.”

Even so, it’s an uncomfortable bargain for both of them, John wishing he didn’t need to ask her to be disloyal to Lestrade, for however short a time, and Mary … well, John’s not sure what she’s thinking. She’s risking far more than he’s any right to ask of her.

They pass a grey stone church, and turn into a road where the houses are all 1930s style - brick-built with bow windows and arched porches. They remind John of his parents’ place in Chelmsford, and it’s all so domestic, and normal, and _Middle England_ , that if he hadn’t spent quite so long at Sherlock’s side walking the battlefields of supposedly civilized and fashionable London, he might not be able to believe anything out of the ordinary could happen here.

“The SIM card’s transmitting from an address along here,” Mary announces. “The house at the end of that row.” And she brings the car to a halt a discreet fifty yards away on the other side of the road.

Caught between hope and fear, for a moment all John can do is stare at No 32’s black front door. His heart is beating far too fast, and it feels as if his legs aren’t going to work properly when he tries to stand - but he’s felt all this before and, deep down, he’s still a soldier. He takes a deep breath and unfastens his seat belt, using the movement to disguise the way he’s automatically feeling for his gun.

“Right,” he says, steeling himself. “This shouldn’t take long.”

Mary catches his hand and squeezes it. “Be careful.” He’s about to assure her he will, when she leans across and presses a kiss to his cheek.

Astonished, he blinks at her.

“For luck,” she explains, smiling, although now he’s paying attention, John can see her eyes are saying something else entirely. Something that makes him every bit as much of a shit as Sherlock’s been to Molly.

He swallows. He can’t deal with this now. Can’t even think about it. Later - he’ll sort it out later - because right now, he has far more important things to do.

His instinct is to tear across the street, run up to Moran’s door and kick it in; his training - both military and medical - urges caution. Reconnaissance first. Don’t even think of intervention until you know what you’re dealing with. Meanwhile, don’t go attracting unnecessary attention. John knows he can’t afford to mess this up: Sherlock’s life may depend on it. So he limits himself to marching purposefully towards the house and past it, looking for another way of approaching it less obviously. Luckily there's a narrow footpath between Moran’s end-terrace and the field beside it, leading around to the back of the house, where it’s all very quiet and promising. He’s about to open the gate into Moran’s garden when a kid on a bike comes zooming along the path in the other direction and nearly collides with him. She screeches to a halt, showering his shoes with grit and tattered bits of dandelion.

“You’re not from round here,” she declares, looking up at him, one hand on the handlebars and the other planted on her hip, as if challenging him to deny it.

Further up the path, John can see a woman in her thirties, watching them. Bugger. This could be difficult. “No,” John concedes. “I’m … visiting.”

“Colonel Moran?” The girl tips her head to one side, green eyes unnervingly sharp.

“Yes. D’you, uh, know him?”

Screwing up her freckled nose, she shakes her head, ginger plaits jiggling. “He’s London. You London as well?”

John smiles. Kids are so direct, so curious, and this one seems very bright. “I am. Yes.”

She nods, solemnly. “Then you should go in the shed too.”

Bright, but still a kid, with a kid’s ability to leap from one topic to the next without warning, John amends. “Shed? I can’t see any-”

But she’s already pedalling back the way she came, back to the woman - who appears to be her mother, because after they exchange a few words, the woman ruffles the girl’s hair and hands her something that provokes a high-pitched squeal of delight.

It’s a sweet little scene, but John doesn’t have time for sweet. He’s just glad that, so far, no-one’s suspected him of being up to no good. He pushes open the gate and makes for the back of the house, doing his best to keep out of sight of the windows by hugging first the hedge, then the wall. Back flat to the bricks now, he risks a quick glance in through the nearest window. The room beyond it is a small sitting room. It's empty but he darts past the window anyway - just in case - and presses himself to the wall once more, this time taking a look in through a glass-panelled door. Behind it, there’s an open plan kitchen/dining room - also empty. He checks the garden and the path beyond. No-one’s around. It’s now or never. Turning back to face the door, he brings his right leg up, and kicks it hard, right under the handle. The door flies open, banging loudly as it hits something inside the house, then bounces back. Before it can close again, John rushes through, gun already in hand.

Inside, the house is eerily quiet. If Moran were home, he’d have heard John breaking in and would surely be doing something about it. But, John tells himself firmly, as disappointment makes his heart sink, just because Moran’s not here, it doesn’t mean _Sherlock_ isn’t - he could hidden away, gagged and bound, anywhere - and he flies through the dining room, out into the hallway. He spots the cupboard under the stairs immediately and, heart in his mouth, hoping against hope, he throws its door open, but apart from some old cardboard boxes and a couple of waxed jackets reeking of dubbing, he finds nothing. Upstairs. Sherlock must be upstairs.

The first door John opens leads into a bathroom. It too is empty but there’s a trace of condensation on the window and the room smells faintly of coal tar soap. It’s not much, but it’s something and it sends an electric thrill of hope up John’s spine. A second door opens onto an empty bedroom. There’s no bedding on the bed, just two cases side by side on the bare mattress. One’s an ordinary suitcase, little bigger than an overnight case, but the other … John’s seen cases like that before - at Sandhurst, in Helmand: it’s a gun case, and his hand tightens reflexively around his own weapon.

The final room is the master bedroom, overlooking the street. Like the rest of the house, it’s also empty. However, it’s obviously been used recently. The duvet on the bed is rumpled, the pillows askew. Emulating something he’s seen Sherlock do, John approaches and lays a hand on the bedding, feeling for residual warmth. For a split second, it’s enough to spark that little frisson he always gets from watching Sherlock at work, from watching Sherlock being brilliant and in charge … He can’t let that go. He _won’t_. And if Moran’s taken it away from him, he’ll-

Something creaks behind him and he jerks his head up in alarm, but before he has time to spin around, there’s something hard pressed between his shoulder blades, and Sebastian Moran’s voice is in his ear.

“That’s a .357 Magnum you feel, Captain Watson. It’s loaded. Drop your weapon onto the bed.”

The first requirement for completing a mission is to stay alive. Only an idiot indulges in hopeless heroics. John does as he told and drops the gun.

“Now, raise your hands. Slowly.”

Again John does as he’s told, but it’s not surrender: it’s biding his time, waiting for an opportunity. Meanwhile Moran reaches around him and retrieves John’s Browning from the bed.

“Good. Now you and I are going to go for a little walk together.”

John stiffens. “A walk?” Why would Moran take him anywhere else when he’s already got him alone and at gunpoint?

“You want to see your friend, don’t you?” Moran asks, almost pleasantly. “I thought that was why you’re here?”

A torrent of questions threatens to escape John - Where’s Sherlock? What have you done to him? Is he all right? Is he still alive? Have you hurt him? How would you like me to kill you? - but he manages to stem it. Give nothing away. Let the enemy come to you.

Moran gives him a sharp jab in the back. “Downstairs. Now. Keep your hands in the air.”

Descending the stairs, his senses on full alert and adrenalin flooding his body, John gets a sudden glimpse into what it must be like to be Sherlock. He notices _everything_ \- the ancient texture of the brown and orange carpet underfoot, the framed prints of flowers on the wall, the arthritic click in Moran’s right hip, and the lack of dust on the window frames. And not only does he notice, but it all makes sense. This isn’t Moran’s house. It’s rented. He hasn’t been here long and he isn’t planning on staying. It’s merely a staging post. Which means-

“Your turning up here is most convenient,” Moran remarks cheerfully, pushing John on down the stairs. “And just when I was beginning to despair of achieving my aims, too! Mr Holmes hasn’t been the most cooperative of hostages, as I’m sure you can imagine, and I'm afraid I’ve had to resort to some rather unsavoury measures in order to get what I need from him but, to tell you the truth, I’m not sure even they will have worked. He’s a very stubborn man, isn’t he?”

John allows himself a wry smile: Moran doesn’t know the half of it.

“Which is why I’m so glad to see _you_ ,” Moran continues. “Although I must confess I’m surprised: from what you said to Martha at the hospital, I really thought you were done with him. But I can’t recall a time when I’ve been happier to have been wrong - because now I have you, and you’re _very_ important to him. You should have heard the way he threatened me when he thought I might harm you.”

John’s stomach drops. He came here to rescue Sherlock, not make things worse for him. Even so, there’s a mad, selfish part of him that flutters excitedly to hear that Sherlock still wants to protect him.

“I won’t help you,” he vows.

“Not willingly, no,” Moran agrees. “But your presence alone will suffice. Mr Holmes is an intelligent man - he’ll understand what continuing to defy me could mean for your safety.” They reach the bottom of the stairs and, as Moran urges John towards the front door, he takes a bunch of keys from a bowl on the telephone stand next to it. “Now, a few rules. You will walk normally. You will not draw attention to yourself or to me. And, in case you find yourself tempted in that direction, I should inform you than I am not working alone, and that if you do anything stupid, I will hit Send on a pre-written text message instructing my men to finish Mr Holmes. Do you understand?”

John clenches his fists. “Yes,” he answers, tightly.

“Good. Now open the door. Slowly.”

Seething with impotent rage, John extends a hand towards the Yale lock but before he can reach it, Mary’s voice carries through from the back of the house. “John! John?”

John feels the pressure between his shoulder blades ease slightly, and senses Moran half-turn towards the kitchen. Quick as a flash, he ducks down, turns, then surges upright again, using his forearm to block Moran’s gun hand and driving Moran’s arm up above his head. Moran stumbles and, as he tries to regain his balance, John grabs him by the wrist and slams his hand back hard against the wall. The impact is enough to knock the gun from his grip and send it clattering down onto the parquet flooring. John seizes Moran by the throat, driving his whole body into the wall, and snatches up the nearest heavy object to hand - which just happens to be a 1960s Bakelite phone. It meets Moran’s temple with a dull thud and the old man goes down.

“John?”

“Moran,” John explains, breathing heavily. “He’s got Sherlock.”

“Where?”

Horrified, John stares down at the now unconscious Moran. “I don’t know!”

“All right. Think. What did he say?”

“He said we were going for a walk.” But what does that mean? He didn’t say _where_. It could have been anywhere!

“A walk,” Mary echoes, nodding. “So, not far. Somewhere quiet, though. Quieter than this.”

“He picked up some keys …”

John drops into a crouch and starts rummaging through Moran’s pockets. His gun is inside one of them and, bending forward to hide what he’s doing from Mary, he quickly removes it and slips it into his own inside pocket. Moran’s keys, he holds out to her.

“Front and back door keys,” she says, going through them. “Some kind of suitcase keys. And these.”

Between her thumb and forefinger, she has two large brass keys. The kind used with padlocks - padlocks big enough to secure outhouses, garages, sheds …

“The shed!” John gasps. “There was this little girl. On a bike. Outside. She said … well, it sounded like Moran’s been using some kind of shed …” He stops, defeated. There’s no shed in the garden, or anywhere obvious.

“There was an agricultural shed, just as we got here!” Mary cries, seemingly excited to be able to contribute. “On the other side of the main road.”

John nods. He remembers it. He squares his shoulders. “I need to get there. Now.”

“I’ll drive you-”

“No.” John shakes his head. Moran said it himself: he has accomplices. John can’t ask Mary to come with him. It’s not her job: if she came, it would be solely because of him, and he’s feeling guilty enough about her already. “No. Stay here,” he says. “Moran’s unconscious. Which isn't good. Especially not in a man of his age. He needs an ambulance and someone to stay with him until it gets here.” With Mary still looking doubtful, John quickly adds, “Look - if there’s any problem, I’ve got my phone and I’ll ring you, okay? Besides, didn’t you want to speak to Lestrade?”

That appears to do the trick, and with Mary busily punching numbers into her phone, John takes off out of the house and down the street, runing back the way they came until, gasping for breath and unable to hear much more than the pulse thumping in his ears, he arrives at the main road.

And there it is. The ‘shed’. An ugly monstrosity of a building, made of corrugated steel, squatting malevolently in a field full of barley. John dashes across the road, narrowly avoiding being flattened by a double-decker bus, and runs up to the door. The larger of Moran’s padlock key slides into the lock like a hot knife into butter, but John finds it wasn’t needed: the thing is already open. He gives the door a shove, but it stays firmly closed. Of course! It will be locked from the inside when the shed’s in use.

For a moment, John considers shooting his way in. Then he remembers the hours he spent removing shrapnel from a gung-ho young squaddie who tried the same trick in Sangin. The kid lived, but had to be invalided home, dreadfully scarred and blind in one eye. No, trying to shoot his way in would definitely be Not Good.

But there are _two_ padlock keys on Moran’s keyring. And if there are two keys, there must be two ways in.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

Breathing hard, exertion forcing the air from his lungs and making him bare his teeth, Sherlock twists, pulls, and tries to dig his heels in as Pike and Carey haul him back to the pillar. It took them a good fifteen minutes to get his jacket, shoes, trousers and pants off, and he’s determined it’s going to take them _considerably_ longer to tie him up again. Pike’s already sporting a split lip (blood droplets from the cut will be useful DNA evidence) and a gloriously lurid bruise on his left cheekbone (let’s see him try explaining _that_ to a jury). For his part, Carey has a black eye and - very probably - a broken nose. (Which, admittedly, wasn’t a particularly brilliant move. No chance of exploiting his antagonism towards Pike now.)

Panting, Pike tries to prise Sherlock’s right arm away from his side but, since Sherlock knows what letting him succeed would mean (it’ll get wrapped around the pillar and cuffed to the left one), he’s keeping both arms rigid, and he barges his shoulder into him, knocking him momentarily off-balance, earning himself a stream of abuse and a hissed vow of “I’m bleedin’ well gonna make ya suffer for this.”

“I’m _already_ suffering,” Sherlock hisses back, taking the opportunity to kick a heel back hard into Carey’s shins. “Have you any idea how poor your diction is?”

“Ain’t nothing wrong with my dick!” Pikes cries, making another grab for Sherlock’s arm.

Pivoting on the ball of one foot, Sherlock brings his other leg up and drives his knee into Pike’s thigh. “A shame the same can’t be said about your brain,” he sneers, as Pike howls with pain and breaks off trying to manhandle him in order to rub frantically at the injured muscle. “I’ve met more intelligent _pigs_.”

“Yeah?” Pike spits back. “Well, you’re gonna be squealin’ like one soon enough.” And he comes at Sherlock again, head lowered, arms outstretched and grasping. It’s easy enough to deflect the attack (sidestep, seize his wrist and _twist_ ) but, for a split second, it distracts Sherlock from keeping track of Carey as well, and the next thing he knows, Carey has him in a stranglehold he can’t break free of.

“Enough fannying about,” Carey growls, propelling Sherlock ahead of him with a series of vicious jerks. “Let’s get this over with.”

Even through his shirt, the pillar is cold against Sherlock’s heated skin, and he gasps as Carey shoves him up against it. Meanwhile Pike has recovered himself enough to make another attempt at seizing his arm, and this time when Sherlock tries to fight him off, Carey grabs him by the hair and whacks his forehead into the metal. As pain shoots through Sherlock’s entire head and stars burst behind his eyes, there’s a click, fingers around his left wrist, then a second, far more worrying click.

“Got ‘im!” Pike crows. “Now, ’elp me get ’is legs spread.”

(Oh god. Ohgodohgodohgod.) Any hope Sherlock had of kicking out at them rapidly fades as Carey seizes one ankle and Pike the other. A length of rope is tied around Sherlock’s right ankle, the scratch of its coarse fibres burning his skin. When he’s happy the knot is tight, Pike yanks the rope out sideways, tugging on Sherlock’s leg until it’s at an uncomfortably wide angle to his torso. “Look at ya now, Mr Bigshot! Trussed up like a Christmas turkey!” Pike gloats, and he gives the rope another yank. “Make a wish!”

Sherlock grits his teeth, and stares straight ahead, refusing to look at either of them. He’s furious with himself for having been so easily outmanoeuvred - he very nearly deserves all he gets now - but as he stares, he sees something move. Against the far wall. A shadow. A shape. It disappears from view for a moment, hidden behind a stack of wooden pallets, but a moment later, it’s there again. Nearer. More solid. A person. A man. (Oh god - it’s _John_!)

Sherlock’s first thought is that he must be hallucinating. That’s he’s conjured John’s image out of desperation and fear. That it has to be nothing more than wishful thinking. (Because John can’t be here.) (He doesn’t know where I am.) (How could he?) But then John grins and puts a finger to his lips, and the gesture is so John doing his cheeky schoolboy routine at the most inappropriate moment that Sherlock is certain it _is_ him, and his whole body strains towards him, craving warmth, and comfort, and _John_. Meanwhile his mind starts to reel with excitement at this new and unexpected data. (John is here. He’s come to rescue me.) (Which means - What does it mean? Does it mean he’s forgiven me? That we can go back to how it was? Move back into 221B together and-)

Even though he’s still keeping to the shadows, John is close enough for Sherlock to make out his face now, and he searches it intently for clues. (The set of John’s mouth is serious, his jaw muscles tight, his nostrils flaring.) (At first glance, his mood might be read as one of angry resolution, but it’s not. The angle of his eyebrows is all wrong for anger - pulling together but upwards, not down - and his lips haven’t thinned enough.) (He’s not angry. He’s anxious. Appalled.) Suddenly, Sherlock sees himself through John's eyes - battered, half-naked, pathetic and helplessly bound - and the shame of it makes him start struggling again. He wrenches his untied foot from Carey’s grip and kicks it back and forth, rotating his ankle first one way, then the other, because he can’t bear seeing John look at him that way a moment longer.

Meanwhile, John keeps creeping carefully closer and a new fear strikes at Sherlock’s heart. (Oh god. What if Pike and Carey see him? What if they capture him too?) Terrified, he fights harder, kicks, and spits, and tries to bite. (Whatever happens, they mustn't see him. They mustn’t look up.)

John coughs loudly. “Gentlemen. If I might, uh, have your attention?”

(So much for Pike and Carey not looking up!)

Carey swears and leaps to his feet. Pike scrambles to follow suit.

“Who the bleeding hell are you?” Carey demands.

“More to the point - ’ow the 'ell did ’e get in? You forgot to lock the bloody door, didn’t you?” (Pike is afraid.) (Good.)

“Of course I didn’t!” Carey snaps back, but he’s frowning. (He’s not sure.) (And now they’re bickering. Turning on each other. Excellent.)

John stands smartly to attention. “I’m Captain John Watson,” he announces crisply. “Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. And I’m angry.”

“Are you?” Carey laughs, advancing on him with menacing slowness. (He’s twice John’s size, and sure he’s got the advantage.) “Are you, really? What d’you expect _me_ to do about it?”

John stands his ground, completely uncowed. “I expect you to release my friend and give him his clothes back.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Oh, that’s simple.” With lightning speed, John whips his pistol from his pocket, and levels it at Carey’s massive brow. “If you _don’t_ , I shoot you in the head.” And he smiles - he actually _smiles_.

Sherlock’s heart swells with pride. (John is perfect, wonderful, amazing. A _lion_ of a man.)

(Unlike Pike, who’s more of a rat.) Out of the corner of his eye, Sherlock can see he’s already trying to slope away (like the nauseating little coward he is) but when John fires a warning shot into the ground near his feet, he stops dead in his tracks. (If jumping into the air with a strangled scream counts as stopping dead in one’s tracks.)

“The next one goes through your knee,” John says, his voice pure steel. “Release my friend first - and give him his clothes back. Then I might think about letting you go.”

Carey hesitates (you can almost see the wheels grinding round in his head) (he’s wondering if a man who’d come armed to the rescue could really be that forgiving), but Pike instantly scurries back and starts fumbling with the rope around Sherlock’s ankle, fingers clumsy and useless in his panic. “I can’t …” he cries, as the knots refuse to budge. “Don’t shoot! Please! Don’t shoot!”

“Bloody hell,” Carey grumbles. “If you want a job doing …” He raises both hands. “Can I ..?”

John gives him a curt nod. “Try any funny business, and you’re dead.”

With a murmur of assent, Carey returns to Sherlock as well. He uncuffs his hands, then, pushing Pike out of the way, bends down to inspect the rope. After a couple of pokes at it, he straightens up again.

“I’m gonna need to cut it,” he announces. “I’ve got some knives over there-”

“Yes,” John interrupts icily. “I noticed. All right. But if you so much as nick him-”

“I won’t.”

Hands back up above his head, Carey walks over to where he wheeled the trolley aside - slowly, steadily, in a rhythm clearly designed to keep John from getting jumpy. His own hands free at last, Sherlock shakes some life back into them, then reaches down to feel the rope around his ankle, sure he can manage untying it better than either Pike or Carey.

All of a sudden, three things happen in rapid succession: some kind of metal container hits the ground with a heavy, almost rubbery sound; John shouts a warning; and then there’s the tell-tale _whoosh_ of ignition. Sherlock snaps his head around, to look back over his shoulder. (Smoke. Flames. Fire.) It’s big already, and getting much, much bigger as it zips along the ground, consuming dry bits of straw and scraps of paper, and leaping wildly into the air. With a shriek of terror, Pike makes a run for the door. Carey is already there.

“Sherlock!” John sounds anguished as he races closer and kneels at Sherlock’s feet, pulling uselessly at the rope.

“Get a knife!”

“Yes. Knife,” John agrees. "Good plan." He abandons his hopeless efforts and, hand over his mouth and nose, but coughing anyway, he runs to snatch a blade from Carey’s extensive range. He’s back in a heartbeat and sawing with desperate intensity through the rope. It seems to take ages, and Sherlock’s afraid it’s going to take him more time than they have when, at last, the frayed strands break and the rope gives.

Immediately, there’s a supportive arm about Sherlock’s waist - warm and strong and utterly _right_. “Can you walk?” John asks him gently. (Too gently.)

Sherlock's all too aware of how he must look (terrible) (and god only knows what John thinks he deducing from the lack of trousers and underwear) but the last thing he wants to see in John’s eyes is that awful pity. It makes him bristle and pull away. “Of course I can.”

If John notices the sharp edge to his reply, he doesn’t let it show. “Good. Come on, then. We need to get you out of here.”

Sherlock couldn’t agree more but when he tries taking a few steps on his own, he discovers he does need John’s support after all (and - god! - it’s humiliating!) (It must be the lack of sleep, the lack of food, the tedium of being tied up for so long).

“Brilliant deduction, John,” he sneers, glaring at the flames. They’re already much fiercer, spirals of choking black smoke billowing from their edges, and even from ten yards away, the heat is terrible. “I’m interested to hear what genius plan you-”

John’s arm wraps around him again, tighter. “There’s another way. Come on.”

Grudgingly, Sherlock allows himself to lean on him, and together they stumble away from the fire towards what until now had seemed like the doorless rear of the building. Somewhere outside a siren wails (someone must have seen the smoke and called the fire brigade) but waiting to be rescued is out of the question (there are too many inflammable items lying about - old pallets and crates, used feed sacks, a bale of hay), so they keep half-hobbling, half-running for what Sherlock can now see is a standard-sized door, set into one corner at the back of the shed.

They’ve almost reached it, when a woman’s scream pierces Sherlock's ears.

“John! John!”

They both turn.

Beyond the flames, near the main door, a silhouette is just about visible, hesitating.

John inhales sharply. “Mary,” he says in a voice so quiet, Sherlock can barely hear it. (There’s something in that voice. Something-) But then John is yelling, at the top of his lungs, and gesturing wildly with the arm that’s not around Sherlock. “ It’s all right, Mary! I’m fine! We’re both fine! Get back!”

( _Mary_.) Sherlock narrows his eyes at John. (Not that John notices.) (He’s too busy looking at _that woman_.)

Mary raises her hand, gives a single wave of understanding but as she starts to back away, a sudden gunshot rings out and she drops like a stone.

John’s arm falls from Sherlock’s waist. “Mary!” he cries. “Oh god.”

Despite the flames, Sherlock can tell from his body language (chin jutting, shoulders down, upper body leaning forward) that he’s contemplating trying to get to her. “ _No_ ,” he says fiercely, and grabs John by the elbow. “Don’t be an idiot. You’ll be asphyxiated before you get anywhere near her.”

“But-” John pleads, straining against Sherlock’s hold.

Usually, he has nerves of steel in a tight situation, but right now he looks wretched, riddled with guilt - and about to do something breathtakingly stupid. (Literally.) Sherlock tightens his grip, and yanks him closer.

“You want to help?” he demands, when John shoots him a furious Let Go look. “Then use your _brain_. Your precious sentimentality won’t help. We need to get outside. She’s near the door - you can run around the building to get to her. That way, you’ll at least have a chance of dragging her out without getting both of you killed.”

Sherlock’s logic is (naturally) unarguable, and he feels the tension drain from John’s arm.

“Right.” John nods, though his voice is flat, numb. “Yes. Outside. Good. Come on.”

Once again, John’s arm snakes around Sherlock’s waist and they cover the final few yards to the door in seconds. John throws it open and bundles Sherlock through, out into all-encompassing, almost painfully bright, grey-green light. Sherlock squints against it for a second, then as the pleasure of fresh air overwhelms him, he allows his eyes to close fully, so that he can savour the moment and the wonderfully cooling sea breeze on his face. He collapses against the wall, John at his side, coughing out smoke and gulping in sweet, salty air.

When Sherlock finally opens his eyes again, it’s to find they’re standing in a seemingly endless field of gently waving barley. And that there are four men, clad in black and wearing face-masks, pointing sub-machine guns (Heckler and Koch MP5s) at them.

 

* * * * * * * *

 

**_12.15 pm_ **

 

Things are moving too fast for John. What he really wants is a few minutes alone with Sherlock - to check him out emotionally, as well as physically - but it’s clear he’s not going to get them. No sooner has one of the soldiers shed his trousers and persuaded Sherlock into them, than the other three are escorting - some might call is ‘marching’ - them around to the front of the building, where they’re blinded by a barrage of flashing cameras.

“Oh god - the papers,” Sherlock deduces with a sigh, as they’re steered closer to each other and the flashes go off again. “Tedious.”

He sounds amazingly calm, if irritated. John only wishes he felt the same, but how can he? The only response he’s had to his questions about Mary was a single, curt ‘It’s being taken care of, sir’ and Sherlock is covered with lacerations and contusions. The ones John can see look are bad enough, but it’s the injuries he can’t see that are really worrying him. Those bastards stripped Sherlock of his pants and trousers, for god’s sake, and John reminding himself that perfectly decent squaddies would sometimes do the same in Afghanistan in an attempt to stop prisoners from trying to escape isn’t helping: Sherlock has a history. _Issues_. He may be brilliant and arrogant - and utterly bloody impossible at times - but he’s also fragile, sensitive and highly strung. He’s just a past master at hiding it. John would give anything right now to know he’s all right - but no sooner has the thought entered his head, than his stomach begins churning with guilt. At least Sherlock's alive: Mary was _shot_. She might be dead.

Not that that possibility seems to be worrying anyone else. They’re too busy checking light levels and fiddling with their lenses.

“We’ll do the inspector’s piece to camera now,” a man in a well-cut navy suit announces and the pack of photographers gathered in front of them parts to reveal a somewhat embarrassed-looking Lestrade shuffling forward. Following the reporter’s directions, he takes a position to Sherlock’s left and the flashlights fire again. A microphone is shoved into Lestrade’s face, and the man in navy comments in an introductory kind of way, “Inspector Lestrade - you must be very glad to have finally caught the Baker Street Sniper after all the press criticism.”

Greg clears his throat. “Uh, yes. We are. Glad. Very glad. And we have one man to thank for that: Sherlock Holmes.”

John can hardly believe his ears. What the hell is going on? Is Lestrade implying that Sherlock is part of this circus? That he got himself kidnapped _deliberately_? As he struggles to process Lestrade’s words, the BBC Kent camera that had been trained on Lestrade and the reporter pans right to focus on Sherlock instead. Sure no-one’s interested in him, John tries to step back out of shot but his attempt is thwarted by Sherlock who seizes the back of his jacket and refuses to let go, insisting, “Smile, John. They want us to smile.”

“Without Mr Holmes’ bravery and self-sacrifice,” Lestrade goes on, his intonation weirdly stilted, almost as though he’s reading from a script, “we might never have got him. Because Sebastian Moran is not only the Baker Street Sniper, but the acting head of an international criminal network founded by the late James Moriarty.”

“James Moriarty,” the reporter nods, and the camera pans back to focus on him as he explains to an imaginary audience, “The man at the centre of the scandal which resulted in Sherlock Holmes’ disgrace a year ago - and, which viewers may remember, led to him taking his own life by jumping from the roof of Barts hospital in central London.”

Lestrade clears his throat again. “Yes. Though, obviously, Mr Holmes didn’t commit suicide.” He laughs awkwardly. “Nor should he have. He’d done nothing wrong. Everything Moriarty said about him, everything he told the papers, was a lie. Mr Holmes is - and always has been - a great man. An honest man. Painfully so, sometimes. Ask anyone who knows him.”

There’s a ripple of polite laughter while Lestrade smiles uncomfortably, and Sherlock glowers at him.

“But when you feared the plan to seize Moran might have gone awry, you decided to effect a daring rescue?” the reporter prompts. “You must be very proud of your men, Inspector. They did a magnificent job - particularly considering the building was on fire.”

Sherlock gives a soft snort of contempt and tosses his head. “ _His_ men! Idiot.”

John knows what he means. There may be a trio of police cars bearing the Met’s coat of arms parked out on the main road, but John recognizes military when he sees it. What he can’t understand is why Lestrade immediately launches into another odd-sounding speech, this time extolling the virtues of the Metropolitan Police force. He only hopes his complete failure to mention Mary is a good sign.

Meanwhile one of the armed soldiers sidles up quietly. “This way please, Doctor Watson. Mr Holmes. Your car is waiting.”

Retinas still seared by the flashlights and dancing with a patchwork of crimson rectangles every time he blinks, John peers in the direction the man is indicating, and suddenly everything makes sense. There's a sleek black Jaguar parked a hundred yards away, all by itself, out on the main road. It’s one of Mycroft’s, of course, and as they approach it, John can see that Mycroft himself is inside, occupying one side of the back seat and smiling like the cat that’s got the cream. Sherlock gets in beside him and reluctantly, John follows, climbing into the front passenger seat. He’s never liked getting into Mycroft’s cars: they seem designed to make him feel small, and powerless - and he’s feeling both of those already. His grand rescue of Sherlock, his proof that he’s sorry for turning him away, for not having had faith in him, has gone horribly wrong and Mary’s been hurt. On top of that ... John sneaks a look back at Sherlock in the wing mirror as he fastens his seat belt and his stomach clenches. Whatever the truth about his abduction is, those injuries are real enough. Too real.

Looking down, Sherlock plucks with obvious distaste at the coarse material of his borrowed trousers. “I could have done without the press conference, Mycroft,” he drawls, rubbing at some mark he appears to have found.

“Yes, well, Lestrade needed a little help,” Mycroft replies airily, examining his nails. “ _The Mail_ has been leading a witch hunt against him ever since Mrs Hudson’s little accident. Dropping snide remarks about his poor judgement and reminding readers how easily he was taken in by _you_.”

“So you decided to call in the _SAS_?” Sherlock asks. “For a petty criminal and a couple of moronic henchmen? No wonder the country’s finances are in such dire straits.”

“For Moriarty’s second in command,” Mycroft corrects, with a sniff. “Plus a man with a string of convictions for ABH and a serial rapist. I’d say calling in the SAS was entirely justified.”

A serial _what_? _Oh god_. John wishes he hadn’t heard that. He feels cold, sick.

“Moriarty’s second in command, a man with ABH convictions and a serial rapist,” Sherlock reiterates softly, and in the mirror, John sees him press his palms together and tap his forefingers against his lips, a far away look in his eyes. “You knew.”

Mycroft laughs gaily. “Yes, well, surely it was obvious Moriarty must have had _someone_ running his organization. The man was hardly stable, and even criminal networks require discipline and man-management skills.”

“No. You _knew_.”

“That Moran was back in London? We suspected he might be, but it was your tiger’s hair that confirmed it.”

“Tiger’s hair?” John twists around in his seat. “What tiger’s hair?”

Sherlock waves the question away. “It’s not important, John. I’ll tell you later. For now, I’m more interested in finding out precisely when my dear brother realized I’d walked into a trap set by Moriarty’s _second-in-command_.”

The corners of Mycroft’s mouth twitch, and he fiddles unnecessarily with the perfect knot of his striped, silk tie.

“Mycroft?” Sherlock’s tone is almost amused. He actually sounds _pleased_ with himself.

Mycroft throws up his hands. “All right, all right. I knew from the start. But we needed to catch him - he has all sorts of information on all sorts of people - powerful people, dangerous people - and he’d evaded even my best men. We already knew he was interested in you, so when, in all innocence, Abigail brought me what she believed to be a message for you from John, it was simply too good an opportunity to be missed. You should have been completely safe - the driver who took you to the meeting place doubles as a bodyguard - but unfortunately, he fell foul of our friend Carey. The head wound needed eight stitches.”

Realization hits John hard. His throat tightens and a wave of cold fury washes over him. “You used me. You used me to send _your own brother_ walking into a trap?” It’s all he can do not to reach over the back of his seat and grab Mycroft by his perfectly knotted, striped, silk tie and strangle him with it; he’s certainly not ruling the option out. “You heartless _bastard_.”

“And you wonder why our family Christmases were so ghastly,” Sherlock sighs, rolling his eyes.

Mycroft clears his throat. “I may have … made some minor errors.”

“Minor?” John growls. “You call letting your brother fall into the hands of a rapist a ‘minor error’?”

“We didn’t know about Pike,” Mycroft insists, colour rising in his cheeks. “Moran may have thinned out the odd endangered species in his time but, according to our records, the worst he’s ever done to a human being - outside of his army career, of course - has been a bit of punching. He’s always had a reputation for being an officer and a gentleman, in fact.” He swallows awkwardly. “We had no idea he could be so … desperate.”

“Well, you’ve got a bloody good idea now,” John tells him. “Your brother’s proof of it. Look at him!”

Mycroft’s eyes dart towards Sherlock - John’s too, pity and protectiveness welling up inside him.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Sherlock snaps. “Either of you. There's nothing wrong with me. I’m _fine_.”

“Yes.” Mycroft forces a smile and pats his forearm. “I’m sure you are. But you’ll humour me, hmm? Let me take you to a nice, _quiet_ little hospital I know to be checked out? To be sure?”

“I’m already sure,” Sherlock hisses. “I don’t need a hospital. I want to go home.” He pauses, and looking directly at John, lowers his voice to that bone-melting, gravelly rumble John’s always found irresistible. “I’ve got my own doctor.”

“Don’t be absurd, Sherlock,” Mycroft says. “John isn’t your doctor.”

“Yes,” Sherlock says, holding John’s gaze. “He _is_.”

John has rarely felt _less_ like a doctor: instead of backing Mycroft up like a sensible professional would, he’s overcome with need and selfishness, every part of him aching to take Sherlock back to Baker Street. He tries to fight it but with Sherlock looking at him that way …

“Well, John?” Mycroft presses when, after several long moments, John has still failed to say anything. “What do you think? He’ll be a hellish patient, of course, but can I rely on you to take care of him?”

Eyes still locked with Sherlock’s, John slowly nods. “Yes. Of course you can, Mycroft. Absolutely. Yes.”


	7. Intensive Care

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Making it better involves a correct diagnosis and appropriate care.

**_Friday, April 19th - 3.25 pm_ **

Instead of taking them straight back to Baker Street, as John expected, Mycroft’s driver makes a stop in Whitehall, taking the Jag down into the carpark beneath Mycroft’s office building. The car swings smoothly into a wide, well-lit bay. It’s not your usual office carpark, John is unsurprised to discover. It’s clean and bright, the paintwork fresh, and the walls totally free of graffiti. There’s an attendant’s office - complete with an actual, human attendant - and plenty of obviously fully functional security cameras. It’s so _not_ like an ordinary carpark that John would bet, if he rolled his window down, there wouldn’t be so much as a whiff of petrol, let alone the smell of alcohol or stale piss.

Mycroft unfastens his seatbelt, opens his door and steps out of the car. John’s ready to follow suit when Sherlock gives a defiant snort. “I said I wanted to go _home_ , Mycroft.”

Bending down, Mycroft peers back inside the car. “Don’t be ridiculous. You need medical attention and, whilst I’m happy to leave you in John’s capable hands-” He pauses to direct a belatedly inclusive smile at John. “-I really must insist that he tend you in properly hygienic surroundings with access to the best quality dressings and medicines. I’ve _seen_ inside your bathroom cabinet in Baker Street. Hardly _Casualty_ , is it?”

“I’ve got some-” John starts, only to remember his first aid kit is miles away, in his flat. He turns to Sherlock, hoping to reason with him but his arguments instantly die on his lips: Sherlock is sitting with his arms firmly crossed, an implacable expression on his battered face. This is why you never treat loved ones, John remembers: they don’t respect your authority like a normal patient would.

“John can pop down to Boots,” Sherlock declares, flashing Mycroft an on-off, I-Win smile. “I hear their range is quite comprehensive.”

A noise, a little like steam escaping a pressure cooker, issues from between Mycroft’s clenched teeth. “Why must you always be so intransigent?” he demands. “I _worry_ about you!”

“I never asked you to!” Sherlock shoots back. “Why must you always be so interfering? Are you really that lonely?”

Mycroft flinches minutely at the jibe and recoils, and for a moment John’s heart goes out to him: caring for Sherlock is a tricky business, as likely to get you your head bitten off as a word of thanks. _More_ likely. Then he remembers that Sherlock would need a lot less caring for right now if it weren’t for Mycroft.

He turns to Sherlock. “Mycroft’s right. I need all sorts of things to treat you properly - antibiotics, antiseptics, dressings, plastic wound closures, painkillers-”

“I doubt he has anything strong enough to get rid of the constant pain in my neck,” Sherlock grumbles, and he looks so ridiculously childish with his bottom lip jutting, that John would laugh and kiss it, if it weren’t for that painfully deep gash.

Ignoring Sherlock’s sulking, Mycroft gives John a grateful smile. “Of course. Why don’t you come up with me-”

“I’m _not_ stepping one foot back in there,” Sherlock insists, tossing his head.

“No-one’s asking you to,” John tells him. “I’ll treat you back at the flat. You just sit here. I won’t be long.”

* * * * * * * *

In John’s absence ( _John’s_ , because who cares about Mycroft?), Bentley makes no attempt at conversation (thank god). She doesn’t even glance Sherlock’s way in the rearview mirror, leaving him to await John’s return in peace. (Peace? This isn’t _peace_. This is the very opposite of peace.) (Waiting is _intolerable_. Being kept hanging about by Mycroft, worse.) (What are he and John talking about? Are they busy deciding they know best, punctuating every sentence with ‘Poor, poor Sherlock’?)

Sherlock fidgets in his seat, uncomfortable. Injuries are one thing; being treated like a child something else entirely. (John likes Strong, and Confident, and In Control - and Mycroft is destroying what little is left of that fantasy with his stupid fussing!) Sherlock would give anything not to have had John see him at Pike’s mercy (because it’s hard to come up with an image less likely to arouse John’s admiration or desire). It’s going to take a lot of work to delete _that_ from John’s hard drive.

* * * * * * * *

When, at last, Mycroft’s driver pulls into the kerb outside 221B, Baker Street is busy with office workers on their way home. Sherlock alights from the vehicle and cuts through them without a backward glance, leaving John to make a quick grab for the medical supplies Mycroft has provided and offer the driver a mumbled ‘Thank You’.

The noise from the street dies away as soon as the front door closes, and John shivers a little at the sudden loss of the warm, afternoon sunshine on his back. In front of him, Sherlock is already ascending the steps up to the flat, back straight, head held high. If John didn’t know better, he might think there was nothing wrong with him.

At the top of the stairs, Sherlock waits, holding the flat door open to let John enter. As soon as he’s inside, he closes it firmly and, very deliberately, slides the bolt across.

With a start, John realizes that the relief he’d expected to feel at it just being the two of them again, back in Baker Street, is completely missing; instead, he feels awkward, almost shy. Even if Sherlock weren’t in need of medical attention, they can’t just go back to normal. Not yet. Not before John’s confessed. Apologized. God knows, he’s got a lot to say sorry for. He wasn’t just unreasonably angry with Sherlock; he’s the one who let Moran know he was back in London. If he’d just kept his mouth shut instead of whining to Mrs Hudson-

“Alone. At last,” Sherlock says, unbuttoning his jacket, and he turns to John, a small smile playing about his lips.

His closeness, the sound of his voice make John’s heart thud, and he wants nothing more than to push him into a chair, crawl onto his lap and put his tongue in his mouth. Instead he takes a step back.

“Sherlock - before you - I mean, I need to …” He breaks off: he has no idea where to start.

Sherlock freezes, and his smile fades. He pulls himself taller and looks away.

“Listen, Sherlock,” John says, trying again, because this is ridiculous. They’re both grown men. They shouldn’t be dancing around each other like terrified teenagers. “There’s something-”

Sherlock cuts him off with a bored sniff. “I’m going for a shower. You can do your doctoring when I’m clean.”

* * * * * * * *

Sherlock spends a long, long time under the shower. He’s never been able to stand being dirty for any length of time, and the need to wash that place from his skin, to be utterly rid of the taint of Carey’s hands and of Pike’s, is overwhelming. The water is blissfully warm, the smell of the soap sharp and astringent. When he finally switches the taps off, he feels more like himself again: contained and detached, not ragged and needy. A fresh shirt and crisply pressed trousers complete the feeling of being back in control.

Inevitably, going back into the living room, and catching sight of John again threatens to undermine all that. John is sitting on the sofa, perched right on the edge, elbows resting on his knees, hands clasped, with both thumbs between his teeth. (He’s biting his nails.) (He’s anxious. Concerned.) ( _Worried_ about me.) And, of course, he gets instantly to his feet and hurries over the moment he looks up.

“Don’t fuss,” Sherlock warns. “I’m fine.”

“Yes, yes. Of course you are,” John nods, clearly not believing it. He takes Sherlock carefully by the elbow and steers him towards his chair. “But just sit down for a minute, and let me-.” He stops abruptly, and looks up at Sherlock, eyebrows pulling together, eyes darting about. (The possibility of something grim has occurred to him.) “You _can_ sit comfortably, can’t you? In the car, you didn’t seem-”

“They didn’t rape me, if that’s what you’re asking,” Sherlock scoffs, and practically throws himself into his old chair (by way of proof), draping his arms over the armrests, and leaning back, spread legs bent loosely at the knee. “Come on - let’s get this over with.”

With a quick nod of understanding, John drops to his knees in front of him and, taken aback by this approach, Sherlock has to close his eyes for a moment (because it’s impossible not to think of all the other times John’s done exactly this - for an entirely more pleasant purpose). And when he feels John shuffling forward between his thighs, it’s all too easy to imagine he can feel the moist warmth of his breath on his skin-

“I’m going to murder your brother,” John vows, breaking the spell.

Reluctantly, Sherlock opens his eyes again. “You’ll wait your turn,” he tells him with mock severity, before risking a smile. Despite his obvious worry, John immediately smiles back. (Thank god.) Sherlock lets out a slow breath. (That’s better. Us against Mycroft. Us against the world.) “Of course, security would never let you anywhere near him.”

“Oh, I’d find a way,” John insists. He takes Sherlock’s left hand in his and unbuttons his shirt cuff. “I’m a trained killer, after all.”

“You’re a _doctor_ ,” Sherlock corrects, arching an eyebrow at the way John has discreetly rolled his sleeve up and is now deftly palpating the cuts and bruises on his lower arm whilst pretending not to. “Look at you.”

John’s smile widens. “Nothing gets past you, does it?” But then he looks down and, seeing the red marks left behind by the handcuffs, his smile disappears, replaced by seriousness. (Cuts and bruises can be come by in an equal fight, after all. _These_ marks are proof it was far from that.) “Does anything hurt?” he asks softly. “Anywhere?”

Sherlock shrugs. “No more than you’d expect.”

John has moved on to his other shirt sleeve now, and is giving Sherlock’s right arm the same, tender treatment. “None of this looks too serious,” he murmurs. “Though this cut-” He traces a fingertip down the longest of Carey’s incisions (three inches, slightly ragged). “- and one or two of the ones on your face could probably do with stitches. I don’t think they’re going to scar, but let’s be on the safe side, all right?”

“All right.”

“And, uh, what about elsewhere? Anything on your back? Your abdomen?”

“Only what you’re able to see. But you’re welcome to check further, if it would put your mind at rest,” Sherlock offers, then adds in his sultriest tone (because John is being too controlled, too ridiculously selfless), “Do you need me to strip off, Doctor?”

To his amused delight, the suggestion makes John splutter and his cheeks turn pink. “I, uh … Yes. I mean, _no_. That won’t be necessary.” He gets back to his feet and hurries over to the sofa and Mycroft’s medical kit. (To cover his confusion.)

(Is he confused? Why is he confused? What has he got to be confused about?) Sherlock frowns, his amusement gone. (John’s never been embarrassed by such blatant encouragement before. What’s going on?) (Has this got anything to do with Mary?)

Returning to Sherlock’s side (but standing this time, not kneeling) (he’s making some kind of point, insisting on distance), John takes a small bottle from the medical kit and pours a little of its contents onto a cotton wool pad. “I need to sterilize your wounds,” he says, hand hovering close to Sherlock’s jaw. “Hold still - this might sting a bit.”

As soon as the pad touches Sherlock’s skin, it makes him jerk bolt upright, hissing with pain. (Sting? It’s like liquid fire!) “A _bit_?” he demands, glaring up at John.

“Shh,” John soothes, smiling indulgently. “It’ll ease off in a minute.”

It does, but that’s little comfort because now John is giving the cut on Sherlock’s cheekbone the same treatment and another acid spike rips through his nerves. He grits his teeth, determined to stay quiet this time, but that doesn’t stop John noticing his discomfort.

“Would you like me to slow down a bit?” he offers (all soft voice and soft eyes). (And _pity_.) “Or I could give you a painkiller?”

“No. Just get on with it,” Sherlock growls and, by gripping the armrests of his chair tightly, he finds he can just about bear John tending the cuts on his forehead, but when a newly soaked pad is pressed to his split lip (bloody hell, that hurts!), he can’t help twisting violently away from John’s ministrations with an angry, “Careful!” (Oh, _wonderful_ \- more indignity.) He blows out a breath or two until the pain subsides, then turns back to John - only to notice that the little muscles around his eyes and the corners of his mouth are working overtime. (He’s trying not to grin from ear to ear.)

He fails. “You’re such a baby!” he laughs. “Come on, Sherlock - it’s not _that_ bad.”

“We don’t all share your enthusiasm for pain,” Sherlock snaps back, embarrassed, infuriated and humiliated for the umpteenth time in the past twenty-four hours. “It’s not _my_ idea of fun.”

The words are out of Sherlock’s mouth before he can stop them and the silence that follows seems to go on forever. John’s hand drops away from Sherlock’s face and his eyes narrow.

Sherlock swallows. (Damn it!) “John-”

“It’s not my idea of fun, either, you _dick_ ,” John says, through gritted teeth.

Wrong-footed, flailing, Sherlock reaches for the comforting security of logic. “The _evidence_ ,” he snorts, “suggests otherwise. You’re exceptionally easy to please afterwards. I’ve timed you. It takes you less than a minute to reach orgasm. I mean, you’re always enthusiastic, but it normally takes longer than that. Ergo, you find pain enjoyable. _Fun_. There’s no point denying it: it’s the only possible explanation of the data.”

“Wrong! It’s _one_ explanation of _some_ of the data,” John spits back. “Your problem, Sherlock, is that you _see_ but you don’t _observe_.” He pauses, visibly shaking. “Jesus. That’s what you thought. All along. That all I was after was some kind of cheap thrill. It never occurred to you that I thought it meant something.”

Sherlock’s totally out of his depth now. He should probably shut up (that would definitely be John’s advice) but the point is (surely?), that it’s always been John’s idea, not his. What _John_ wanted. “Dress it up however you like, John. The fact is, you - what was your delightful way of putting it? Oh, yes - you _get off on it_.”

John gives a bitter laugh. “And you _don’t_ , I suppose? You’re always so bloody desperate to feel _safe_ , Sherlock. D’you think we’d even _be_ in this relationship if you hadn’t thought you’d always have the upper hand - even in bed? You were terrified of me even touching you before.”

Sherlock stares at him in disbelief. (This John looks the same as the real one, his voice sounds the same, but the words coming out of his mouth …) In all the time Sherlock’s known him, John has never mocked him for the fear he once had of physical intimacy. In fact, up until this point, he would never have believed John could stoop so low. But he’ll be damned if he’ll let John know he’s shocked him. Instead he adopts a tone of airy superiority.

“There’s no need to be defensive, John. I told you: I’m fine with it. And there are good physiological reasons for your deriving pleasure from it: the enkephalin and endorphins released in response to pain bind with opioid receptors in the brain, inducing euphoria. Akin to a runner’s high. It’s perfectly rational.”

“God! It’s always about the bloody chemicals with you, isn’t it? It never occurs to you there might be actual human feelings involved.” John shakes his head, and his eyes squeeze shut, almost as if he’s trying to blank out physical discomfort, then he turns briskly away and starts hunting through the medical kit again. Tearing the wrapper off a plastic stitch, he tilts Sherlock’s head to one side in silence and, without even meeting his eyes, applies the stitch firmly. (All medical professional now.) (Not lover.) (Not even friend.) He’s so annoyingly distant and composed that Sherlock is suddenly seized by a ferocious need to make him fall apart.

“What feelings?” he demands, snatching him by the wrist. “How am I supposed to know when this is the one thing you’re not prepared to lecture me on at mind-numbing length!”

John yanks his hand free, eyes blazing. “Oh, that’s good. That’s _very_ good. Well done. I feel _really_ comfortable now. And yes, that’s sarcasm, in case you were wondering.” He inhales noisily and grinds his teeth. “You haven’t got any bloody sense, have you?”

Sherlock surges up from his chair. “Apparently not,” he spits. “Not where you’re concerned.”

( _Hell_. That was tantamount to a declaration of undying love.) (And, judging by the look on his face right now, that’s the last thing John wants.)

For a long, awkward moment, they stand staring at each other, not knowing what to do.

“John-”

“You’re hurt,” John says dully, looking away. “And I’m tired. I can’t do this now. I’m going to finish patching you up, then I’m going to bed. If you really want to, we can talk in the morning.”

* * * * * * * *

**_Saturday, April 20th - 8.15 am_ **

John’s first thought on waking is that he’s got to cut back on the beer a bit when he goes to the pub with Mike, or he’s going to end up like Harry. He feels groggy as hell: thick-tongued and fuzzy-brained, and not entirely sure which way is Up. But as the pieces of yesterday start slotting into place, he remembers he hasn’t been out for a drink with Mike in over a year, much less got drunk with him. No, the leaden limbs and aching muscles are the result of too little sleep and too much adrenalin, and running about like a man half his age.

Tea. He needs tea. Badly.

The next few minutes are spent hunting unsuccessfully for his dressing gown, until it dawns on him that it’s miles away, in East Dulwich. A vague memory of Mycroft promising to have everything from the flat brought around to Baker Street teases at John’s brain but, since there’s no dressing gown in sight - or any of his other things, for that matter - he wonders if, perhaps, he dreamt it. Or maybe Mycroft forgot. No - Mycroft never forgets _anything_. In that case, perhaps the courier got no reply when they knocked. John only hopes that if a courier _did_ turn up, they didn’t wake Sherlock: he was exhausted. Battered and exhausted. The horrifying sight of him - bruised and bleeding and tied up - flashes into John’s mind and he shudders. _Jesus!_ \- Sherlock had been seconds away from being raped. No wonder he was so obtuse last night: he can’t have been thinking straight. It was stupid to have taken offence at the things he said. John sighs: it would’ve been stupid in any event. Just because Sherlock’s a genius, it doesn’t make him a mind reader. If he doesn’t understand that John’s definition of ‘fun’ encompasses things like stealing ashtrays from Buckingham Palace, or taking the piss out of Mycroft, or convincing American tourists you’re the police, but absolutely _not_ Sherlock using his crop on him, then that’s John’s fault, not Sherlock’s. He should have told him ages ago that to him, it’s, well, _sacred_. True, he’d have felt a tit saying it out loud but, seriously, that’s how it feels: all that he is - not just the good bits, but the pathetic and rubbish bits no-one else gets to see too - all of it, in Sherlock’s hands. Pure, and stripped away, and sacred. A weirdly holy kind of communion. What they do instead of talking.

Except that now it looks they’re going to have to do some talking as well.

John glances at himself in the mirror. He’s still wearing yesterday’s - no, _Thursday’s_ \- shirt and pants. The shirt’s got even more crumpled overnight, and the pants … well, he won’t think about the pants. He’ll just put on the rest of yesterday’s clothes and head down to the kitchen and pray there are teabags in the cupboard and milk in the fridge.

Not wanting to wake Sherlock if he’s still asleep, he descends the stairs as quietly as his stiff hamstrings will allow and opens the living room door carefully. The curtains have already been flung all the way back and the room is flooded with light. The air smells strongly of coffee.

“Sherlock?”

No answer - but there’s an almost empty cafetière on Sherlock’s desk.

John goes into the kitchen. The kettle is empty, but still warm against his hand as he refills it, and when he opens the fridge, there’s not only milk but bread and butter too. Even a pot of jam. It’s a miracle.

“Sherlock?” John calls softly in the direction of Sherlock’s room.

Again, there’s no reply, so John makes himself tea and toast and takes it over to Sherlock’s desk so that, for the first time in almost a year, he can look down onto Baker Street as he eats. However, as he pulls out the hard-backed chair, his gaze falls on something stuck to the tabletop beside the cafetière: a note, in Sherlock’s distinctive handwriting, on a yellow Post-It.

_New case. No idea when I’ll be back. SH_

_PS Mary fine. In St Thomas’._

_Convenient. You’ll be able to visit_

_on your way to work_

John’s first reaction is one of hurt. Sherlock has started on a new case without him. When he was hoping they could talk.

His second reaction is a double-whammy of guilt. He ought to be worried that Sherlock’s taken off on a case before he’s properly healed, not feeling abandoned and unwanted. And he really ought not to have forgotten he doesn't know whether Mary's alive or dead.

* * * * * * * *

**_9.00 am_ **

Sherlock is trying not to think about how badly things went with John last night but the case before him has little to offer in the way of distraction (the solution is obvious), and scanning the contents of Anthony’s Alsopp’s office only reminds him of all the ways in which a doctor can go wrong. His desk is littered with notepads from SmithPine Blackwood and pens from Pharmartes (handy aides-mémoire should he forget who paid for that Michelin-starred dinner, or that ‘fact-finding tour’ of the Seychelles) and his walls are plastered with professional certificates so gorgeously illuminated they look like pages from a Bible (an open invitation to develop a God complex and a sense of entitlement). There’s even a lockable drugs cabinet in the far corner (affording ready access to all kinds of hypnotics, paralytics and poisons). (It’s astonishing _more_ doctors don’t take to crime.)

Not that Sherlock is worried about John being tempted in any of those directions. (His moral code is far too quaint. It goes beyond what’s right and what’s legal: it’s part of him.) (And whenever he thinks he’s fallen short of it, he’s ridiculously hard on himself.) (Far harder than anyone else would be.) A wisp of something - too shapeless to be deemed a thought, but too unexpected to be ignored - shimmers at the back of Sherlock’s mind, apparently random fragments of data picked out by its dim light, as it tries to find substance, form-

“Tea? Coffee?” Alsopp asks ( _interrupts_ ), reaching for his intercom handset. On either side of it stands a silver-framed photograph - a smiling blonde in one, a pair of bright-eyed, shiny-haired boys in the other. (Wife. Children. Dull.) “My secretary might even be able to rustle up some biscuits, if you’re so inclined.”

“Digesting slows me down.” Sherlock’s reply is blunt and deliberately ungracious. (Those photographs are unnecessary. Annoying.) (Proof that when a doctor manages to avoid going wrong, he can go hideously ‘right’ and become a respectable pillar of society. Law-abiding. Ordinary. ‘Good’.) Sherlock could kick himself now for his stupidity: he should never have told John where to find his precious Mary Morstan. “Tell me - quickly - have there been any developments since I was here last? I haven’t got all day.”

Alsopp briefly raises an eyebrow at Sherlock’s tone, but he makes no comment on it. (Of course, he doesn’t. He’s desperate. He _needs_ me.) He rises from his chair and crosses the room to close the door carefully. He tries to close the blinds too, but the mechanism is jammed, forcing him to abandon the attempt and return to his seat.

“Another set of trial data has been altered.”

“You’re sure?”

“This time I entered the figures myself. It took me most of Thursday evening. When I checked yesterday afternoon, half of them - the placebo results - had been changed.”

“Changed how?”

“Downgraded, essentially. Made to look worse than they in fact were.”

Sherlock nods. (The motive is obvious: to make the test drug look more effective.) (Downplaying patient response to the placebo will contribute to that.) (Admittedly, the culprit is less self-evident.) “How many people have access to your system?” he asks, with a glance towards Alsopp’s computer.

“It’s part of the hospital network, but all files relating to the cardelapril trials are password-protected.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. “Doctors and passwords: a combination that rarely results in Fort Knox level security, in my experience.”

Alsopp straightens his back and frowns. (He’s feeling challenged. Threatened.) (Interesting.) “I assure you-”

Sherlock cuts him off. “How many people know it?”

“Seven. Myself, my five research team members and my secretary.”

“And they all input data? Daily?”

“In theory. Although John Watson’s fallen somewhat behind. Apparently he moonlights as an amateur policeman from time to time.”

Ignoring the pointed comment, Sherlock gets to his feet. “Then I need to question them. All of them. Now.”

* * * * * * * *

_**9.20 am** _

John is on his way into the kitchen to rinse his breakfast things in the sink when he hears a soft rap on the living room door, followed, as it opens, by Mrs Hudson’s familiar, “Ooh-hoo!”

“Mrs Hudson!” He sets his plate and mug down on the nearest half-way clear surface - a space on the bookshelf - and hurries to greet her. “How are you? How’s the arm?”

She waves a dismissive hand. “It’s fine, dear. Which is more than can be said for Sherlock, isn’t it? Whatever happened? He’s all ...” Her fingers flutter meaningfully about her face, and her mouth twists. “You two haven’t had another domestic, have you?” she adds, with a sudden and disapproving frown.

“ _No_ ,” John says earnestly. “Nothing like that.” And then it hits him that Mrs Hudson doesn’t know. About the kidnapping, or about Sebastian Moran’s part in it. He supposes it’s up to him to tell her. He certainly doesn’t want her hearing it from anyone else, when there’s no-one she knows around to reassure her it wasn’t her fault. “I, uh - would you like a cup of tea? I’m just having one.”

Mrs Hudson looks pointedly at his mug and plate. “Haven’t you just had one, dear?” From the way she’s pursing her lips, John can tell she already knows something’s up.

“I have,” John admits. “But you can never have too many cups of tea, can you? Why don’t you take a seat, and I’ll see if I can find some biscuits.”

“Bottom cupboard by the window,” Mrs Hudson tells him, as he picks up the kettle and heads for the sink to refill it. “I got you chocolate digestives and Jammie Dodgers - I know how you like your jam - and there’s a bit of fruit cake too.”

Kettle in one hand, and about to turn on the cold tap with the other, John stops abruptly and goes back into the living room. “You shopped for us?”

“Just this once, dear,” Mrs Hudson replies, settling into his armchair with a little wiggle as she makes herself comfortable. “I’m not your housekeeper, remember?”

“But-” John is confused. Both he and Sherlock have been living elsewhere. How could Mrs Hudson possibly have foreseen that this morning, they’d have moved back in together. _If_ , he amends uncertainly, that’s actually what they’ve done. “Whatever made you-”

“Mycroft Holmes.” Mrs Hudson’s nose wrinkles as if she’s just caught a whiff of something unpleasant. “He called yesterday morning - not long after you left, actually. Asked me to go to the supermarket for you. Honestly, John - why didn’t you tell me yourself instead of rushing off? I’d’ve had time to get some of that bread you like from Sainsbury’s before it all sold out.”

“Never mind about the bread,” John says gently. Much as he’s sure Mycroft’s interest in their groceries is something he needs to think about, that can wait. “You haven’t seen the news yet, have you?”

“I always get the paper when I go out for my morning walk,” Mrs Hudson replies cheerfully. “Ten o’clock, every day. Like clockwork. So much nicer than the television news. You can turn the page, if you don’t like it.” Then a shadow crosses her face. “Why? What’s happened?”

“It’s nothing to worry about,” John insists, “but I’m afraid I’ve got something to tell you. About your friend Sebastian.”

* * * * * * * *

_**12.25pm** _

Sherlock follows Alsopp down another hospital hallway, a rather pleasant tension building in his abdomen. He’s seen four offices already. The next will be John’s, somewhere he’s never been before, and the promise of discovery is thrilling. Almost as if he were about to lay bare some previously unstudied part of John himself, some secret part of his body.

The office door is another cream-painted number, dull - like all the others. The nameplate may be different (Dr J Hughes, Dr J Watson) and the tracery of scratches over its surface unique (indicating it’s been pushed open with the toe of a shoe, or with the corner of a sharp-edged box file more often than the norm) but in all other respects it’s identical. (No-one would guess what treasures it holds.) Sherlock stands outside it, holding his breath.

“And this room,” Alsopp declares, opening the door after the briefest of knocks and without bothering to wait for a reply, “is John Watson’s.”

Sherlock’s heart skips at the mention of John’s name (ridiculous!) and, as he steps into the room, his pulse quickens. He stands motionless for a while, breathing in the atmosphere, letting the room speak to him. Two desks (two occupants). (John and a professional colleague he probably considers a friend.) (He likes almost everyone.) Cheap carpet tiles, flimsy furniture. (This room is allocated to newcomers, people passing through, on temporary - not permanent - contracts.) (John has no ties with the place. None beyond his quaint sense of duty, anyway.) A coat rack. A pot plant. The smell of coffee-

Sherlock spins around expectantly, but the eyes looking at him quizzically are green, not brown. For a brief moment, he sees recognition in them (dear god, did the entire country watch yesterday’s news?) (people don’t even need the deerstalker now to know who they’re looking at) but they slide away quickly in Alsopp’s direction, leaving Sherlock time to take in their owner: average height, average build (taller than John and heavier); wavy brown hair tamed with product of some kind (keen to fit in, to look the part); a slight sag to the shoulders, dull skin (he was up late last night-)

“Professor Alsopp.” Hughes’ greeting is slightly breathless (surprise, fear). “There isn’t a problem, is there, sir?”

“We’re here to speak to John Watson.”

Hughes exhales softly (relief). “Sorry. Haven’t seen him … yet.” (The addition of ‘yet’ betrays a desire to shield John from Alsopp’s displeasure. Hughes is fond of him.)

“No,” Alsopp agrees, gruffly. “I don’t suppose you have.” But when he turns to Sherlock, it’s with a smile that he adds, “Not after his heroics yesterday. More than meets the eye, John Watson, isn’t he? But since he’s not here, perhaps we should go back to my office?”

Sherlock doesn’t reply. (There’s a lot to be learnt from a room.) (None of it relevant to the case in this instance, of course, but that’s beside the point.) He wants to find a clue, something (anything!) that might help him persuade John that, no matter what he may _think_ he wants, his place is at Sherlock’s side. (He _cannot_ be allowed to pursue his association with Mary Morstan any further). The first thing Sherlock notices, as he sits down down at John’s desk, is that - unlike Hughes’ paperwork, which is scattered about all over the place - _John’s_ has been stacked in neat piles, at right angles to the desk’s edges. (John’s army training lives on.) The pens have been tidied away into a holder, and there are no ring marks left by spills of tea of coffee. (John likes order - almost as much as he enjoys _orders_.) (Certainty - as well as danger.) As Sherlock runs his fingertips over the smooth surface of the desk, pondering how best to exploit this side of John’s nature, he hears Hughes address Alsopp.

“Do you need me to stay, sir?”

Alsopp grunts, presumably in the negative, because a moment later, Hughes is exiting the room again, his white coat still unbuttoned, offering Alsopp an “I’ll get out of your way then, sir” and Sherlock an “It was a pleasure to meet you, Mr Holmes.”

“If you need to switch Watson’s computer on,” Alsopp says, as soon as he’s gone, “it’s the second switch on the wall.”

Sherlock steeples his fingers, gazing into the darkness of John’s computer screen. He might be tempted if he didn’t already know the kind of sites John’s history is usually full of: sports, cookery, army blogs and finance pages, with the odd foray into showbiz gossip sites if he’s spent too much time watching television with Mrs Hudson. He shakes his head. “That won’t be necessary. We both know who the culprit is, and we both know it isn’t John Watson. One: he didn’t have the opportunity, and two: he’s not nearly ambitious enough. Mistry had the opportunity, but no motive. Did you notice his watch? Patek Philippe, _last_ year’s model, not this. Expensive but not flashy. He’s rich enough already, genuinely interested in doing good. Mason’s determined to prove herself as skilled as any man and, frankly, Patterson’s an idiot when it comes to spreadsheets. He’d never be able to cover his tracks convincingly.”

“David Armitage,” Alsopp says, after a pregnant pause. “I had hoped it might have been one of-”

“Yes,” Sherlock interrupts. “You had. But that’s not why you called _me_ in. The police could have handled this. _I’m_ here because you suspected it was Armitage all along - but you don’t want him arrested. You just want him scared. You want me to catch him red-handed. Now, why would that be?” Sherlock pauses, studying Alsopp’s face. The corners of his mouth are pulled back (regret) and his gaze has slipped minutely to the left (he’s recalling something). Sherlock points an accusing finger. “Sentiment! You want to keep the police out of this for sentimental reasons.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Alsopp blusters, but his nostrils (flaring excitedly) prove he most certainly does. “And if you’re implying-”

“Don’t waste my time, Professor Alsopp,” Sherlock interrupts. “If you want my help, you’ll have to tell me the truth.”

Alsopp sighs. “All right. I knew his grandfather. He was head of faculty when I started out. Back then, I was hot-headed, greedy for success, and impatient. I, well, I tried to cut the occasional corner, myself. Take the odd short-cut. He found out. Hauled me over the coals and gave me the most grisly shift pattern for two whole years. But he didn’t throw me out. He said he knew I had potential, even if I couldn’t see it myself. I owe him, Mr Holmes.”

“How very old school … tie,” Sherlock sneers, not bothering to try hiding his distaste.

“You’re a young man,” Alsopp replies. “Have you never made a mistake?”

Too many, Sherlock thinks. Almost all of them involving John. He turns his gaze back to John's computer screen and his reflection looks back him - lost, adrift.

“Can you help?” Alsopp presses. “ _Will_ you help?”

The question is like a lifeline and Sherlock seizes it gratefully. (Work. Work matters.) (Even if it’s no longer _all_ that matters.) “We need to put pressure on him. When does the trial end?”

“Not until November, but Pharmartes has asked for interim data to present at their AGM at the start of next month. It seems their investors are getting nervous about long term profitability.”

“So they need good results from the cardelapril trial to boost investor confidence,” Sherlock muses. “Which is why they want the data now. When do they want it in by?”

“The end of the day. Not all of it, but whatever we’ve got by 5pm.”

Sherlock grins. “Excellent. That means Armitage will be forced to act today.”

“I thought so too,” Alsopp says, his voice thick with uncertainty. “Before yesterday. But now your face has been splashed all over the news, everyone knows you’re still alive, after all. Armitage recognized you, I could tell. He must have guessed why you’re here, so he’ll be on his guard.”

It’s true. Sherlock frowns. His reflection frowns back.

And then it comes to him.

He leaps up from the chair, clapping his hands together in sudden glee. (The game is on!)

“I know a way to put him at ease,” he smiles. (Enigmatically, because clients love that. They love a spectacle, a show.)

“You do?”

“I’m going to be very evidently otherwise engaged. Because, Professor Alsopp, the best way to convince someone you’re not in location X is to give them _proof_ you’re in location Y. Let them _see_ you there, with their own eyes. Phone calls, emails - everyone knows can be faked, but real time, visual proof? No.”

“I don’t see-” Alsopp begins, shaking his head.

“Of course you don’t!” Sherlock agrees. “And neither will Armitage. That’s the beauty of it. I want you to hand over any unprocessed data you have to Armitage and ask him to input it in time for the deadline. Tell him you can’t do it yourself as you’ll be in a meeting with me in your office on an unrelated matter - make something up! - until at least six o’clock. Now-” He beams at Alsopp, beginning to enjoy himself at last. “-if you’ll excuse me, there’s something I need to get from my brother.”

* * * * * * * *

_**10.20am** _

The hospital shop has three types of bouquet: a spindly bunch of purple daisies at £2.99; a bouquet of pink and yellow roses at £9.99; and an armful of lilies, carnations and gypsophila for £29.99. John’s been standing in front of the row of plastic buckets, trying to choose, for ten minutes now. Price- and size-wise, the roses would be the most appropriate but, well, _roses_. Roses imply certain feelings. _Romantic_ ones. Apparently, even _Sherlock_ knows that. If John turns up at Mary’s bedside with roses, she’s bound to expect things he can’t give her. Meanwhile, the longer he dithers, the worse the slightly sick feeling in the pit of his stomach is getting. The conversation they need to have is going to be horrible. John hates hurting people, hates watching the light of hope in their eyes dwindle and die. He’s seen enough of that in his professional life, without it happening in his private life too. He snatches up a bunch of the lilies and marches decisively up to the counter.

And somehow ends up buying a vast box of Guylian seashells as well because a) they’re half price and b) now he comes to think about it, even an expensive bunch of flowers doesn’t seem adequate to the task of thanking someone for risking their life for you, right before telling them you’re sorry but you’re in love with someone else.

Mary is in Page ward. High dependency, but not - thank god - intensive care. John takes a little comfort from that. Even so, it takes him a couple of minutes to compose himself enough to push through the lime-green double doors.

When he finally sets eyes on Mary, the relief is enormous. Not only is she conscious, but she’s propped up in bed, watching telly. The oxygen mask and the serried ranks of monitoring equipment are standard, he tells himself firmly. The drip lines too. No cause for alarm.

“John!” she croaks, hastily removing the mask as he walks over. Her eyes light up when she notices the flowers. “Wow. Are those for me?” Her voice has a raw, recently intubated quality, but there’s delight in it too. Delight, and _hope_.

 _Bugger_.

Suddenly, the clean shirt John borrowed from Sherlock’s wardrobe is not just a very snug fit but far too tight, and the pants he took from his chest of drawers far too noticeably not his own. But there’s nothing he can do to make either of them more comfortable and, anyway, if he feels awkward, it’s no more than he deserves.

“All for you,” John confirms, forcing a smile as he sets the flowers down on the bedside cabinet, and slides the box of chocolates onto one of its shelves.

“Chocolates as well?” Mary smiles back, and her lovely eyes seem bluer than ever against the pallor of her cheeks. “What have I done to deserve all this spoiling?”

“I heard you took a bullet.”

“Only a little one,” Mary grins, moving a stiff arm, drip lines wriggling in its wake, as she points to the spot. “Right here, in my side. In through the back and out through the front. But I was lucky, apparently. They said that it would’ve been much worse if it had lodged somewhere.”

“Yes,” John agrees. “It would.” He knows. Even so, he thinks he’d take that bullet to the shoulder again right now - shattered bone, grazed subclavian artery and all - if it meant he didn’t have to disappoint Mary.

“There’s no need to look so glum - I’m fine,” Mary insists, reaching out to squeeze his hand. “Or at least, I will be soon enough. Then you can take me out to dinner again. And somewhere a bit fancier than The Warwick this time.”

“Mary-”

“How’s Sherlock? Is he all right?”

Mary’s question - her mention of Sherlock’s name - throws John. He was just working his way up to saying how much he values her _as a friend_ , and that he’d love to take her out _as a friend_ \- hoping that would lead gently into the topic of why she can’t ever be anything more to him - but now he feels as if he’s been flung into deep and fast-running water.

“He’s … fine,” he flails. “Probably. Physically.”

Mary frowns, the delicate skin on the bridge of her nose wrinkling prettily. “You mean he’s not so good emotionally?”

John’s on the point of explaining exactly what Sherlock went through, when suddenly he just _can’t_. “I don’t know,” he says miserably. “I’m afraid I wasn’t very patient with him.”

“Oh. That’s not like you. You’re always so kind.”

“I wanted to take care of him, fix him, but he’s so difficult. And he’s vicious when he feels vulnerable.”

“Oh, John. I’m sorry. I can see it’s upset you. You’re very fond of him, aren’t you?”

John closes his eyes. He’s not as brave as people think. He can’t look her in the eye and say this. “I’m … It’s more than ‘fond’. I’m … we’re … well, we _were_ …”

“Oh.”

John forces his eyes open again. Mary is very quiet, very still.

“I’m sorry. I should have told you. Weeks ago.”

He hears her swallow. Watches her blink too rapidly. Sees her fight the way the corners of her mouth want to turn down. It makes him feel like an absolute shit.

“Mary-”

“No! It’s fine!” she says, a tight smile now stretched across her face. “I’m glad for you. For both of you.” She laughs ruefully, and shakes her head. “I should have realized. The way you had us dashing off to Kent like that.”

“I like you, Mary, I really do. If things had been different-”

“But they’re not, John,” she interrupts. “And it’s not your fault.”

John could give her a list of reasons as long of his arm why it absolutely _is_ his fault, but he just smiles at her weakly. “Friends?”

“Of course,” she agrees. “Friends.”

There’s not much to say after that. John racks his brain for a safe topic of conversation, but everything he comes up with either starts or ends with Sherlock. He can’t even think of a good joke to tell her.

“I should probably put this back on,” she says eventually, taking hold of her oxygen mask.

“Yeah.”

“And get some rest.”

“Yeah,” John says again, reluctant, yet desperate, to leave. She’s not crying. Mrs Hudson didn’t cry either. Instead, just like Mrs Hudson, Mary looks abandoned and defeated, but doing her utmost to put a brave face on.

“Good-bye, John,” Mary prompts, as he continues to hesitate. “Thanks for coming. And for the flowers and the chocolates.”

“I’ll come again,” he promises. “Soon.”

Mary nods. “That would be nice.” And then she puts the oxygen mask back on her face, and closes her eyes, leaving John to slip quietly away, hating himself.

Outside, the April sunshine is unreasonably bright, the puffy little white clouds scudding through the gaps between buildings unfeelingly cheerful. John finds a low wall to sit down on and pulls out his phone.

_Text: I was a tit last night. Sorry._

* * * * * * * *

_**2.30pm** _

Head cocked to one side, Mycroft looks down at his fingers as he slowly drums them on the top of the cardboard box on his desk. “I don’t know, Sherlock. It’s government property now. Material evidence. It may even make an appearance at Moran’s trial.”

“Are you going to let me borrow it or not?” Sherlock demands. (Because asking Mycroft for anything is hateful.) “I _need_ it. And you owe me.”

“Do I?” Mycroft raises his eyebrows incredulously. “Would you care to elaborate?”

“You used me. You used me to help you catch Moran,” Sherlock replies, flinging the words at Mycroft like daggers. (And if they hurt him, so much the better.)

Mycroft (damn him) merely laughs, and lounges back against his desk. “Don’t tell me you actually believed that? How delightful! But do you really imagine we’d let someone like Moran out of our sight for even a second once he was back in the country?”

Sherlock stares at him, and Mycroft smiles back, so completely without guilt, and so utterly at ease with himself that suddenly Sherlock is a child again, in the shadow of his brilliant older brother, struggling to keep up with the sheer speed and scope of his mind. “You said so yourself,” he points out, immediately hating how confused and defensive he sounds. “You said he’d evaded even your best men.”

Mycroft’s smile grows warmer, almost _genuine_. “I said that _in front of John_.” His eyes dart about Sherlock face, watching, waiting for him to catch up.

“You wanted him to believe it,” Sherlock murmurs before he can stop himself (because stating the obvious - to Mycroft of all people - is humiliating). But now he’s started, the deductive part of his brain takes over, picking up clues, stacking and sorting them. “Even though it put you in a bad light. _Because_ it put you in a bad light.”

“Yes!” Mycroft claps his hands together, then leans forward encouragingly, as if Sherlock were a small child, taking his first steps unaided. (He might as well have his arms outstretched, ready to catch me if I fall!) “And?”

“You wanted him to think he was rescuing me,” Sherlock replies.

He’s rewarded with a brilliant smile. “Exactly. John may enjoy your being ‘firm’ with him from time to time, but he’s still a man, with a man’s need to take care of those he loves. I knew if he feared you were in serious danger, he’d rush to your side.”

“But-”

“Your own attempts at wooing him back had been hideously inept. You left me no choice other than to resort to a little melodrama.”

Sherlock’s skin feels too tight, too thin. Raw with embarrassment because, yet again, Mycroft has felt the need to come to his rescue. A better person might feel grateful; Sherlock takes refuge in abstraction and solving the puzzle. “So you asked him to … No, that’s not right. You have the SAS at your beck and call; he’d have realized that. So what did you do, Mycroft? What devious little trick did you employ to persuade him? Ha! You told him _not_ to get involved, didn’t you?”

Mycroft lowers his gaze, fluttering his eyelashes modestly. “I might have suggested he stay out of harm’s way,” he purrs. “And warned him against returning to 221B. Sergeant Morstan did most of the rest. Tracked Moran’s phone signal, found the house he was hiding out in. Drove John to Kent.”

“ _Most_ of the rest?”

“All right, all right! I admit it,” Mycroft says, raising his hands, palms out, almost as if trying not to claim credit for all the neat details of his plan. ( _Almost_.) (He’s probably been dying for this moment.) “Given enough time, Morstan would probably have managed to pinpoint exactly where you were being held, but I needed _John_ to be the one to find you, so I … arranged for him to have a little help. To point him in the right direction.”

“I suppose you expect me to be grateful.”

“Expect? No. Hope? A little, yes.”

“If you’d wanted gratitude, you should have thought it through better,” Sherlock snaps. “Then there might have been something for me to be grateful _for_.”

“Oh, lord,” Mycroft sighs. “Please don’t tell me you messed up at the last minute, Sherlock. All you had to do was let him look after you.” He pauses, squeezing his eyes shut as realization dawns. “But you couldn’t, could you? Not with any degree of grace. Really, I don’t know why either of us puts up with you!”

“You weren’t there. You don’t understand,” Sherlock says heatedly. “He wouldn’t let me … I think-” (No, that’s too personal. Pull back. Objectivize.) “On the evidence of last night, involving Morstan was probably not your cleverest move.”

Mycroft’s eyes fly open. For a minute all he seems able to do is stare, and then he’s laughing, head thrown back and slapping his thighs. “Sherlock, you’re my brother, and you’re remarkably talented - unique in many ways - but you’re a complete fool when it comes to John. He loves you. Go home and sort this out. I do have a country to run, you know. Several, in point of fact. I can’t be constantly micromanaging your love life: régimes will collapse, civilizations crumble. Now, go on. Go.”

Normally the little shooing gesture Mycroft is making would set Sherlock’s teeth on edge, and have him casting about for reasons to stay put but right now, it’s a relief to be dismissed. He could do with time to mull over Mycroft’s revelations in his own time, without his every, lamentably slow thought process being impatiently tracked.

And besides, he has _work_. Mycroft’s not the only one doing his bit for the country.

“All right,” he says, snatching the box from Mycroft’s desk as he rises from his chair. “I’m going. Good-bye.”

He stops once, in the foyer, to check his mobile for texts from Alsopp.

There aren’t any. But there are two from John: one sent at 14.19 pm -

_Text: I was a tit last night. Sorry._

And one sent at 14.28pm

_Text: See you back at the flat? Soon?_

(Two texts - sent within nine minutes of each other - indicate urgency.) (The apology is a peace offering and the call back to Baker Street means John’s wants intimacy, privacy.) Sherlock feels the pulse in his throat jump, as a mad rush of hope warms his chest. He taps in a reply.

_Text: Working. Where are you?_

John’s reply is immediate. (He’s been waiting for a response.)

_Text: St Thomas’. But I can leave. Any time._

Sherlock finds himself smiling stupidly at his screen.

_Text: Stay there. I’ll find you._

John’s reply is a smiling face and a heart.

* * * * * * * *

_**2.40 pm** _

Now that Sherlock’s responded to his messages, John doesn’t know whether to be elated or terrified. He’s aching to see him, to reassure himself that they still have a future together, but when he thinks about the things he has to tell him, the fear sets in. Fear that, once Sherlock learns what an idiot he’s been - about so many things - their relationship will never be the same again. Assuming it even survives.

He finds himself wandering in the general direction of his office, almost on autopilot, and decides that, since he’s here anyway, even though he’s not officially on today, he might as well catch up with inputting data for Alsopp, before he gets kicked off his team on top of everything else.

Jack is at his desk, reviewing notes and cross-referencing x-rays and ultrasounds. He looks up as John enters and grins. “Well, I never. John Watson! The hero of the hour! Aren’t you too famous to be slumming it here with us ordinary people? Shouldn’t you be lying on a chaise longue somewhere, with doe-eyed lovelies feeding you peeled grapes as you regale them with tales of your derring-do?”

“You saw the news, then,” John says, taking off his coat.

“We all did. Even Alsopp. Which, by the way, means there’s no point lying to him about why you weren’t here last night.”

John grimaces. “Bugger. I’m behind with my patient questionnaires.”

“Don’t worry. I think Alsopp was almost impressed with you. He was utterly charming to your mate Sherlock anyway, so I don’t think he’s going to give you too much of a hard time over it.”

“Sherlock?” John turns, puzzled. “ _Sherlock_ was here?”

“Lunch time. With Alsopp. They wanted to talk to you.”

“What about?” John asks, nerves prickling as the words ‘utterly charming to your mate Sherlock’ finally make it through his defences. Sherlock might have answered his texts but his reply was cool and non-committal. It could have meant anything. “I thought you said-”

“It wasn’t about you skiving. It was something else. Don’t know what. I cleared out, and left them to it. But Alsopp was really quite relaxed. You know - for him. I think he was enjoying his opportunity to hang out with ‘the Reichenbach hero’ for a bit.”

Sherlock and Alsopp. Too brilliant, good-looking men. Together. With Alsopp being ‘utterly charming’. John wants to question Jack further, but suddenly Jack’s pager beeps.

“DKA,” he reads, pushing up from his chair. “Theatre two.”

“No.” John stops him. “Let me take it it. That’s more my area than yours.”

“But you’re not even on today,” Jack starts to object but, as his eyes meet John’s, he suddenly stops. He gives John a small smile and steps back. “Go on, then, mate. If you really want to. Be my guest.”

* * * * * * * *

_**4.40pm** _

The cleaner’s green top and black trousers are too big for Sherlock, but that’s fine (looking bulkier will be an advantage) (as will donning the hat). He pulls the hideously unflattering white cotton and polyester number onto his head, and tucks as much of his hair up under its elasticated edge as possible, then steps out into the hall.

A quick glance at Alsopp’s office confirms his plan is a good one. Through the open blinds, Sherlock can see the professor at his desk, deep in conversation with someone sitting opposite him. Someone with pale skin and dark, curly hair, wearing a black coat. Someone who’s so focused on Alsopp, he hardly seems to be blinking. Reassured, Sherlock turns and pushes the cleaning trolley he’s borrowed off towards the research corridor. 

Palash Mistry is the first to leave his office (he’s changed his shirt and tie, polished his shoes and applied aftershave: date tonight), followed five minutes later by Jennifer Mason (carrying a sports bag) (she’s on her way to her fitness club) (mostly likely the onsite Dunhill Centre, given that she’s not wearing a coat). Neither of them notice him. (The cleaner’s uniform has done its job.) Armitage will be another matter. (People going about their normal business don’t generally notice cleaners; those with something to hide are different. The fear of discovery increases adrenalin and cortisol production. Blood pressure rises, pupils dilate. They see more, hear more.) Sherlock wheels the cleaning trolley a few yards further down the corridor and sets about polishing a pane of glass in one of the doors.

At his back, he hears the squeaking hinge of a door opening and the sound of Calum Patterson’s shuffling gait. A soft thud followed by the slithering sound of paper over paper suggest Patterson’s dropped a file full of documents (a suggestion confirmed by Patterson’s weary groan), but after a few seconds’ rustling and a heavy sigh or two, Patterson clears his throat, closes his door behind him and heads off towards Reception.

Sherlock checks the time. (Armitage will have to make his move soon.)

Sure enough, almost immediately, Armitage’s door opens. Sherlock polishes the window pane he’s already polished again, harder, keeping his head ducked down, and his back turned. Armitage steps out into the hallway. At first he just stands there (he’ll be checking to see who’s about), then starts walking briskly - past Patterson’s office, then Mistry’s, then Mason’s. Sherlock doesn’t have to watch him to know what he’s doing: he’s heading for Alsopp’s office, to see for himself that Alsopp really is still in his meeting. A couple of minutes later, he’s casually wandering back down the research corridor - except this time it’s not towards his own office, but to Patterson’s. (Of _course_ he’d choose Patterson’s.) (It points the finger of suspicion at someone else and Patterson’s so clueless he’d never notice whether figures he entered had been changed, let alone think to check his revision history.)

Sherlock gives it thirty seconds (enough time for Armitage to access Patterson’s files) before shedding the cleaner’s uniform and dumping it on the trolley. He strides up to Patterson’s door and flings it open.

Armitage starts at the sound, a wave of shock travelling up his spine and tensing his shoulders (guilt). He spins the chair around, eyes widening in surprise when he sees Sherlock.

Sherlock can’t resist a self-satisfied smile. “You’re surprised to see me,” he deduces, out loud, for the sheer pleasure of being right. “You thought I was somewhere else.”

Armitage flushes red (proving the deduction correct) (as if proof were needed!) but he quickly recovers himself. “I’m going to have to ask you to be just that: somewhere else,” he says, stepping closer (in an attempt to intimidate). “These rooms are private. Reserved for research staff. If you refuse, I’m afraid I’ll have to call security.”

Sherlock side-steps around him, and stoops down to peer at the computer screen. It shows a table, each cell filled with a number - but one of the columns has been highlighted. (Selected for deletion.) Sherlock laughs. “You’re not going to call security, Doctor Armitage. Would you like to know how I know? Because you have too much to lose. Your job, your reputation. Probably your liberty too, if the MHPRA decides to press charges.”

Armitage’s expression takes on a slightly hunted look (wide nostrils, wide eyes) but he tries to bluff his way out. “I have no idea what you’re talking about-”

“I’m talking about massaging clinical data,” Sherlock tells him, straightening up again. “You’re looking at _months_ in prison if-”

Armitage doesn’t wait to hear the rest. He kicks a chair over and then topples a filing cabinet into Sherlock’s path as he makes a dash for the open door. Sherlock clears the chair in a single leap, but the cabinet drawers have opened, spewing files all over the carpet, and he’s forced to run around it. Armitage meanwhile has reached the door and slammed it closed. Sherlock throws it open again, and runs out after him. Armitage has made it to the far end of the corridor, but that’s only twenty yards away, and Sherlock’s legs are longer. He races after him, skidding around a corner and dodging real cleaning staff, until at last - in the open space of the Reception area, and under the startled gaze of both patients and staff, he manages to grab a handful of Armitage’s jacket and wrestle him to the floor.

Panting a little, he looks around at his rapt audience. “I think,” he smiles, “someone should call security.”

* * * * * * * *

**_4.45 pm_ **

John is feeling pretty good: his patient didn’t die. Admittedly, the man _did_ go into cardiogenic shock, and it was a close run thing for a while, as John struggled to keep one of his supple, twenty-six year old veins still enough to insert a catheter, but in the end he succeeded. There was real satisfaction in seeing colour return to his lips and the tip of his nose when the IV drugs started to take effect, and now, as a porter wheels the man off to ICU, John has moment of quiet and confident calm. Everything will be all right, he tells himself - _everything_. It will be hard at first, but then it’ll get better.

He removes his theatre overalls and gloves, washes his face and hands, and checks his phone. No new messages, but that’s all right. Sherlock said he’d find him. He knows where to look. John gets himself a coffee from the vending machine and goes back to his office to wait.

He waits patiently at first. Then, after ten minutes have crawled by, a bit less patiently. After fifteen minutes, he’s too twitchy to sit still, so he chucks his empty coffee cup in the bin and gathers up all his completed patient questionnaires. He’s still missing a few but he wants to show willing and besides, taking them down to Alsopp’s office might help settle his growing nervousness.

It’s a bit disheartening to realize, from halfway down the hall, that Alsopp’s busy with a visitor: John can’t just barge in and interrupt him, and still expect a little credit. However, it’s more disheartening still when John sees who the visitor is. _No_. He refuses to think the worst. This must be the thing Sherlock said he was working on - an entirely _professional_ thing - and as soon as it’s done, Sherlock will come and find him, and they can go home.

John has almost convinced himself when the sky falls in.

Through the office window, he sees Alsopp rise slowly from his chair and walk around to the front of his desk. Perching himself on the edge of it, he leans forward, until his face is scant inches from Sherlock’s. John forgets how to breathe. Sherlock doesn’t move. Why would he? Even in profile, Alsopp’s expression is clear: he’s awestruck, fascinated. He reaches out a hand and touches the side of Sherlock’s face, carefully, reverently, as if he can’t quite believe he’s allowed to touch it at all.

And Sherlock … Sherlock doesn’t do a bloody thing to stop him.

The questionnaires slip from John’s hands. He lets them fall. He’s sick, angry, confused, shocked - yet somehow not surprised. This has been coming since he first saw Sherlock and Alsopp together. He gives a bitter laugh. No, it’s _always_ been coming. He isn’t in Sherlock’s league. Never has been.

The world seems made of some new substance, as he turns his back on them and walks away. Something colder and flatter. Something dull and pointless and dead.

Nothing looks the same as he returns to his office. The walls seem endless - not closing in, but too far away. Too many closed doors, too many windows.

Even Jack looks different. An alien, incomprehensible being, who sits smiling, words John can’t follow tumbling from his lips, as John puts on his coat and leaves.

Outside, the sky has become very grey.

* * * * * * * *

_**5.20pm** _

With Armitage safely restrained by a burly security man and being frog-marched off to Alsopp’s office, Sherlock heads happily - if slightly nervously - to John’s.

Annoyingly, when he gets there, he’s greeted not by the sight he was hoping for (John, looking up, his face breaking into one of those eager, boyish smiles) but by his distinctly _unsmiling_ room-mate Doctor J Hughes instead.

“Where’s John?”

Hughes frowns and scrapes his upper incisors over his lower lip. (Not just uncertainty. _Confusion_.) “I think he went home?” (Rising inflection. Hughes wants reassurance. He’s concerned.)

“You _think_?” Sherlock can’t keep the impatience out of his voice. Doesn’t bother. Hughes is worrying him.

Hughes shrugs. “He didn’t say. Didn’t even answer when I spoke to him. It was almost like he couldn’t hear me. Couldn’t _see_ me.”

“Did something happen? Was he hurt? Was he was ill?” Sherlock is teetering on the edge of grabbing Hughes and shaking him. (You’d think a doctor might take more care of a colleague.) (Of a _friend_.)

“He wasn’t showing any obvious signs,” Hughes replies slowly, nodding to himself (clearly checking off a list of symptoms in his mind). “He just looked a bit … out of it.”

“Yes, thank you, _Doctor_ ,” Sherlock all but snarls. “You’ve been most helpful.”

* * * * * * * *

**_6.05pm_ **

John has always known that, for the area, his flat’s a cheap one - well, what passes for cheap in London - but until now, he’s never realized that it’s nasty too. When he moved in, it was proof that his life was improving, that he was getting back on track; now, after just one night in Baker Street, he can see he was wrong. The place is ugly, cramped, and ill-kept. There are chronic problems with the heating and plumbing that have never been fixed. The taps drip, the drains block and god only knows when the place was last painted.

It doesn’t help that he’s come home to find all of his things missing. Clothes, books, toiletries, RAMC mug, cardboard packing cases - the lot. The furniture and kitchen equipment is still here - even the lighter, easily stolen items like the kettle and the vacuum - and there are no signs of a forced entry so he knows he hasn’t been burgled. No, _Mycroft’s_ been here. Or his minions have. They’ve gathered up every last one of John’s belongings and removed them.

Well, they’ll just have to bloody well bring them all back again, won’t they?

John goes into the kitchen and makes himself a cup of tea in one of the 50s-style teacups that came with the flat - an ugly, chipped, avocado-green thing that holds about five mouthfuls but it’s all he’s got. He takes it back into the sitting room, then fails to drink it, as he cycles compulsively through anger, denial and despair. When he eventually realizes what he’s doing, he decides to stick with anger and stomps back into the kitchen to make another cup of tea - one he’s determined to drink this time. However, as he carries the refilled kettle from the sink to the counter, he catches a glimpse of a dark figure striding past the kitchen window outside. He has no time to wonder who it is: the arrogant banging on the front door makes that much obvious. It’s Sherlock. Bloody, sodding Sherlock.

John stays where he is. If he doesn’t answer, maybe Sherlock will give up and go away.

He doesn’t. He flips the letterbox open and shouts through it. “John! John! Are you all right? Can you hear me?”

Abandoning the tea, cup and kettle, John marches up to the front door. “The whole bloody street can hear you. What do you want?”

“I want to know what’s wrong.”

“Try deducing it, dickhead.”

There’s a pause. “You sound angry.”

John claps. “ _Brilliant._ Sherlock Holmes strikes again! Too right, I’m angry. If you were going to go off with someone else, you could’ve at least had the decency to tell me first. Or is this some kind of punishment?”

“Someone else?” Sherlock sounds genuinely confused, but he’s a master of pretence, so John’s not going to fall for that one.

“Go away, Sherlock. Go back to Alsopp and leave me alone.”

“Alsopp? _Antony_ Alsopp? Are you …?” On the other side of the door, Sherlock has the nerve to laugh. “Open the door, John.” His voice is softly amused. It makes John want to punch him.

“Piss off.”

“John.” The amusement has gone from Sherlock’s voice entirely, replaced by a quiet but steely authority. “Open the door. Now. Or I will kick it down.”

He won’t, John’s sure. Not at this time of day, on a Saturday. There will be people about, people who’d see and-

The door shudders under a sudden and violent blow. It shudders again as it’s struck a second time, and gives an ominous creak. A third hit, and something cracks.

“All right, all right!” John cries, reaching for the lock. “Stop!”

He opens the door warily, left foot out, ready to block it from opening fully, but Sherlock’s too slender, and far too quick. He’s through the gap before John can close it, and the next thing John knows, Sherlock has has him by the upper arms, and is shoving him up against the nearest wall.

“Listen,” John growls, ready to tell Sherlock exactly where he can go, only to to discover that opening his mouth was a mistake. Sherlock’s lips are on his in a heartbeat and his tongue in his mouth, as he uses the entire length of his body to pin John to the damp wallpaper.

“Let me go,” John tries, but the words are lost because Sherlock just kisses him harder, a hand at the back of his head to prevent him from pulling away. John pushes and twists, tries to get a knee to Sherlock’s groin, to _bite_ , but when’s Sherlock response is merely to hold him tighter and kiss him more fiercely still, John can feel his stupid side - the side that’s always thrilled to Sherlock taking a forceful approach - responding. And now John’s being torn in two - fighting himself, as well as Sherlock, because when Sherlock’s like this, John can almost believe he really does want him, that he _matters_. It’s all he can do not to kiss him back and pull him closer. There’s heat and hardness, and nowhere near enough air. If John could just breathe, he’s sure he could get himself under control again, but he can’t. His mouth tastes of blood, his head is spinning and his heart thumping.

Then, all of a sudden, Sherlock pulls back and John knows where that taste of blood was coming from. The cut on Sherlock’s lip is bleeding. The cut John helped close last night is open again and raw. “John. I really don’t know-”

John stamps down ruthlessly on the instinct to take care of him. “I saw you,” he hisses. “With Alsopp.”

Sherlock’s brows pull together into a frown for a second, then he smiles indulgently. “John - as flattered as I am by your conviction that everyone I meet is desperate to bed me, you’re not thinking straight. No, don’t worry - you can’t help it. Love is a dangerous disadvantage. A chemical defect, as capable as any drug of distorting your perception.”

“What would _you_ know about love?” John snarls.

Sherlock’s smile seems almost sad as his gaze travels slowly from John’s eyes to his mouth and back again. “More than I ever wanted to.”

“No,” John says, through clenched teeth, because although he wants to believe him more than anything, he’s not an idiot. “ _No_. I saw you. You were in his office and you were _letting him touch you_.”

Sherlock sighs. “John - how often do I willingly let anyone touch me?”

“Are you saying Alsopp was trying to force himself on you?” John scoffs. Because he knows what he saw, and it wasn’t that.

“I’m saying I wasn’t there.”

Sherlock tries to move in closer again, but John pushes him away. “I _saw_ you. I know you, Sherlock. I’d know you anywhere.”

Sherlock shakes his head. “I’m glad - for your sake - for both our sakes - that that’s not true. If it were, you’d be dead.”

He’s talking in bloody riddles now. “ _What_?” John demands, cross with himself for not following, and furious with Sherlock for daring to try to make him feel stupid at a time like this.

“You saw me fall to my death, and yet here I am,” Sherlock explains, patiently - too bloody patiently, as far as John’s concerned. He bristles and knocks Sherlock’s hand away as he tries to touch him, but Sherlock carries on regardless - if anything, more patiently still. “You saw me lying dead and bleeding on the pavement - you even took my pulse - and yet here I am.”

“I don’t see-”

“Yet again you saw but you didn’t observe. It wasn’t me in Alsopp’s office, any more than it was me on the pavement outside of Bart’s. Did you never wonder why the Bruhl girl screamed when she saw me? It wasn’t just because she was in shock. There was a mask, John -” Sherlock’s eyes light up with excitement, delight. “- a brilliant, lifelike mask. Intricate work - commissioned from an artist called Meunier to add credence to the picture Moriarty was painting of me. The man he chose to abduct the ambassador’s children was my build, my height. All Moriarty had to do was make his face look like mine.”

“That’s …” John shakes his head, speechless.

“Amazing?” Sherlock suggests with a teasing smile, pleased with himself. “Mycroft had been keeping track of Moriarty, and of everyone associated with him. When he saw my analysis of the footprints we found at the school, he knew exactly who the kidnapper was. He still had the mask in his possession. Mycroft sent me a photo of it - my brother’s idea of a joke - but, as soon as I saw it, I realized I could use it.”

“So you came up with a plan,” John nods, although, even now, he can’t help sounding bitter. “You and Molly.”

“You couldn’t know,” Sherlock says quietly. “And Molly was … very kind. Very logical. She found me a suitable corpse and, whilst you were dashing off to what you thought was Mrs Hudson’s deathbed, we dressed it in clothes similar to mine and put the mask on.”

“That phone call.” John points an accusing finger. “That was your doing. I always thought it was Moriarty’s.”

“I had to, don’t you see?” Sherlock pleads. “Everything hinged on you believing me dead.”

John swallows. “Go on.”

“Molly arranged for the body to be put on a laundry trolley and wheeled past the front of Bart’s. When I gave the signal, the body was thrown onto the pavement and I used the trolley to break my fall. All those bribes I paid the homeless network over the years, John - they paid off! One of them wheeled the trolley and pushed the corpse off onto the pavement, and another half a dozen pretended to be doctors and nurses and passers-by to keep people away from the body.”

John’s mind flashes back to that awful day. He remembers running towards the spot, heedless of the traffic. Feels the bicycle tyre hit his leg, knocking him off balance. Remembers how hard the tarmac hit him when he fell.

“The bloke on the bike-”

“A necessary evil. Once you started running, there was only so much time. I had to get off the trolley, and onto the van, and my coat had to be put on the body. You couldn’t be allowed to get close until all that was done.”

“And the people who prised me off you? Off the body?” John feels oddly cheated and vaguely ridiculous. He felt so much pain, so much love for that broken, bleeding body - and it wasn’t even Sherlock’s.

“Yes.” Sherlock raises both hands to John’s face this time, like a prayer. “Them too. I’m sorry, John. But I couldn’t lose you. I can’t lose you now, either.”

“No,” John says numbly, as he tries to process everything Sherlock’s just told him. “Good. But I still don’t get-”

“What the mask was doing in Alsopp’s office?” Sherlock suggests. “It was a trap. For David Armitage. He had to think he knew where I was.”

“David Armitage?” John echoes, bewildered. “Why?”

“He’s been tampering with the drug trial results,” Sherlock explains. “Alsopp wanted me to catch him at it. So I put the mask and a dark coat on one of those plastic skeletons you doctors are so fond of, and bingo!”

All John can find to say is “Oh.” It’s been a very strange week.

Smiling affectionately at his confusion, Sherlock leans in for another kiss but John stops him, a hand on his chest. “Careful,” he warns. “You’re bleeding.”

“Am I? I hadn’t noticed.” Sherlock runs his tongue over his bottom lip. “You’re absolutely right, John - I _am_. I was about to go back to Baker Street but perhaps I need a doctor?”

“It’s not that bad,” John begins, then realizes Sherlock’s eyes are twinkling. He smiles back. “On the other hand, perhaps I should come with you. To be on the safe side.”

“Yes,” Sherlock nods, soberly. “Before you do any more damage to that shirt.”

“What-?”

“Third button down. The stitching is coming undone.”

John peers down at it and grimaces. “Sorry.”

“Actually-” Sherlock grins. “- I’m more worried about what damage my underpants might to be doing to _you_. They’re hardly your size.”

John does a double-take. “What? How can you _possibly_ … Oh, never mind!”

John feels incredibly light as they get into the taxi - as if the burden of the past year has lifted entirely. Happy, too - because Sherlock has chosen to sit very close to him, so close their thighs are touching, and he’s holding John’s hand discreetly, but tightly, in his. However, by the time they’re crossing Waterloo Bridge, John realizes that Sherlock is nowhere near as cheerful as he is. He keeps glancing in John’s direction and tightening his grip every time John shifts a little in his seat. He’s not holding his hand out of a desire to be warm or romantic but because he’s terrified that at any moment, John will change his mind and take off again.

“Sherlock-” John begins, wanting to reassure him, but Sherlock interrupts, his words coming out in a staccato rush.

“Last night, John. What I said. About you. Us. _It_. I didn’t mean-” Then, just as abruptly, he stops, shaking his head and holding John’s hand tighter still.

“No, you were right.” John takes a deep breath. This is going to be hard. Partly because he’s going to feel a total dick saying any of it out loud, but mostly because he’s afraid an explanation will ruin it, break the spell. He doesn’t want Sherlock doing it just because _he_ needs it; he wants to believe it satisfies something in him too. And he doesn’t want it to be ‘fun’, _ever_. “Well, you were a _bit_ right, anyway. I do get off on it. Did. But not just because of the endorphins.”

Out of the corner of his eye - because he can’t look at Sherlock and say any of this - he sees Sherlock looking at him, head tipped to one side.

“Sentiment, right?”

“Right.”

“It meant something.”

John nods again. “Yeah.” He’s surprised. This is much, much easier than he expected. Sherlock really seems to understand. “I thought it meant I could trust you.”

“Trust me not to go too far?”

 _Bugger_. So much for Sherlock understanding. John shakes his head. “I thought it meant I could trust you not to go _at all_.”

Sherlock inhales sharply, and he squeezes John’s hand - once, twice - in a gesture that seems almost like an apology, but John can’t think about that yet. He clears his throat. “It made me feel that you weren’t just being kind to me.”

Sherlock snorts. “I’m not kind, John. Ask anyone.”

John tries again. “And it made me feel that you wanted things from me. From _me_. Even if I’m not …” No, he can’t say it. It’s too feeble.

Even without looking at him, he can tell Sherlock’s focus has sharpened, his uncanny ability to recognize important data making him home in on John’s reluctance to continue. “Not what?”

John squirms. “Not good enough for you,” he mumbles.

He feels Sherlock stiffen, and twist around in his seat to look at him directly. “ _Not good enough_?” He sounds angry, offended. “How can you-”

With a supreme effort of will, and not a little bravery, John makes himself turn around too, so that he can look Sherlock in the eye. He’s frowning, and under his lowered brows his eyes have turned a dark, stormy blue. He’s so very handsome, so very beautiful.

“Have you met you?” John asks. “You’re brilliant, unique. You’re astonishing, amazing - and have you looked at yourself in the mirror? You’re sodding breathtaking too. I’m none of that. Half the time, I don’t even know what you’re doing with me. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

Sherlock frowns, as if John were suddenly talking some obscure foreign language, but if John allows himself to think about what that might mean, he’ll never find the courage to continue.

“Not being sure … sometimes it makes me act like an idiot,” he says, feeling his mouth twist in apology. “I get impatient and forget what happened to you. I take offence and get hurt. Then I do stupid things like sleeping with Sarah or being angry with you for deceiving me when what you’d actually done was _save my life_.” He swallows, bites his lip. “Oh god, Sherlock. I even told Moran you were back in London. I didn’t mean to - I was moaning about you to Mrs Hudson - but if I’d had more faith in you and kept my mouth shut, he’d never have-”

But Sherlock doesn’t seem to be listening. He’s let go of John’s hand to press his own together thoughtfully, and there’s a faraway look in his eyes. “You need me to be angry,” he murmurs softly, in exactly the way he does when he’s feeling his way towards a deduction. “Not simply because it- ah, yes. Of _course_.”

John gapes at him in amazement. Instead of being furious, Sherlock seems to have drifted off into a trance. “Sherlock? Did you hear what I said? About it being my fault-”

Sherlock blinks, and shakes his head, as if awaking from a deep sleep. “Your fault?” He frowns, evidently backtracking through John’s words, because all of a sudden he laughs and waves a dismissive hand. “It wasn’t your fault. It was Mycroft’s. He arranged the whole thing. From start to finish. Forget it.”

“He _what_? How? Why?”

“I’ll tell you later. Because at the moment-” Locking eyes with John, Sherlock lowers his voice to a deep and seductive rumble. “- I have much more interesting things to think about.”

The pitch of his voice and the look in his eyes do predictably evil things to John’s insides. “Uh - do you?”

Sherlock smiles, slowly, and all John can do is watch the curve of his mouth, the dark sparkle in his eyes. “Absolutely,” he purrs. “I’m devising a plan.”

John’s pulse accelerates. He can feel it beating in his upper chest, his throat. “A plan?”

“Mmm. Something that will convey exactly how much I want from you.”

That does it. John’s cock twitches as his blood rushes south. He peers out of the taxi window, looking for a landmark wondering where the hell they are and looking for some explanation for why, in the name of god, they aren’t already in Baker Street.

Russell Square crawls past. Tavistock Square Gardens go on forever. The traffic lights at the junction with Euston Road turn red just to torment him, and a drunk, staggering into the road outside of The Globe on Marylebone Road forces the driver to slam on the brakes, but at last it’s there - the north end of Baker Street. The traffic is surprisingly light. The taxi sails down the street and glides to a halt outside of 221B.

John’s whole body is buzzing with anticipation and he can’t wait to get upstairs, but Sherlock takes an inordinately long time to pay the driver. How can he be so calm, so in control of himself? He smiles serenely at John as the taxi drives away and turning his key in the door, he steps gallantly aside to let John enter first.

“Not just because of the endorphins,” Sherlock murmurs, when at last he closes the living room door behind them. He takes off his coat and tosses it onto the settee. “You said ‘not just because of the endorphins’.”

“Ye-es?” His own coat half-off, John frowns, unsure what he’s driving at.

“It’s your use of the word ‘just’ that interests me,” Sherlock explains, moving closer so that he can help John out of his coat entirely.

“Ah,” John says, getting it now. He wonders if he ought to feel embarrassed instead of weak with lust as Sherlock draws him into his arms.

“It’s exciting, isn’t it?” Sherlock leans in to whisper against his lips, almost, but not quite, kissing him. “Dangerous.”

There’s electricity dancing up and down John’s spine now; he’s hard and aching to be touched - touched properly. He closes his eyes and exhales shakily. “Oh god, yes.”

And now Sherlock does kiss him, one hand along his jawline to tilt his face up, long cool fingers pressing gently into the bone, as his other hand travels slowly down John’s back, pressing him closer until he has him just where he wants him - flush against him, his erection digging into the solid heat of Sherlock’s thigh. Holding him there, with a determined and insistent hand on his arse, Sherlock kisses him with just enough intensity to make John’s heart beat faster, though nowhere near hard enough to satisfy the raging hunger inside him. So John kisses him back, raising his hands to bury his fingers in Sherlock’s hair, and he grinds his cock against him, until Sherlock finally stops holding back. He grabs John by both buttocks and lifts his pelvis higher so that John can feel how hard he is too.

Light-headed with kisses and dizzy with unsatisfied need, John struggles to keep his balance. To his delight, he finds Sherlock’s having trouble too - but a moment later, his heart is in his throat, because Sherlock has let go of him and is starting to sway, his face even paler than usual, his eyes rolling.

“Sherlock!” he cries, lunging for him.

Sherlock crumples, and John, arms wrapped around him, crumples with him, arms straining not to let him hit the ground too hard.

Sherlock is only out for a second or two, but when he comes round again, at first, he has no idea where he is. Then he looks up, sees John and smiles drunkenly. “John …”

“When did you last eat?” John asks sternly. He’s seen this before.

Sherlock grimaces. “What day is it?”

“Saturday.”

“Wednesday?” Sherlock guesses, frowning. “But I had one of those drinks - a sports thing - on Thursday. Lots of sugar.”

Oh god, it’s worse than John thought. “Why didn’t you have something this morning, you idiot? And when did you last sleep?”

“I got an hour or two last night,” Sherlock replies defensively. “And I dropped off several times whilst Moran was holding me.”

“Right,” John says decisively. “You are going to bed. Now.”

Sherlock nuzzles into his shoulder. “That’s what I hoped you were going to say.”

“No. Not us. _You_. You need to sleep.”

Sherlock makes a low grumbling noise in the back of his throat.

“When we finally get round to shagging again,” John tells him, “I do _not_ want you passing out on me. Understood?”

Sherlock gives him a sultry look. “I wouldn’t mind _you_ passing out on me. If it was my doing.”

“Exactly,” John counters, with a grin. “I want there to be no doubt about it, d’you hear me? Now, come on. You’re going to eat something and then you’re going to bed.”

Sherlock grumbles some more but allows himself to be helped up and into his armchair. John opens a can of lentil soup and, whilst it’s warming on the hob, butters some bread. Sherlock isn’t grateful in the least when John puts a tray on his lap and instructs him to eat but, after a bit of cajoling, he finishes the soup and half a slice of bread.

“Done?” John asks, pulling a disappointed face in the hope of guilting Sherlock into finishing the rest but it doesn’t work. Sherlock sets the tray on the floor and closes his eyes.

“Oh, no you don’t,” John says, firmly, tugging him to his feet. “ _Bed_.”

It’s wonderful to feel the weight of him, John thinks, as Sherlock leans against him, floppy with exhaustion and trust. John steers him to his room and onto the bed, where Sherlock allows him to take off his clothes, smiling in a way John’s sure he means to be sultry as John unbuttons and unzips, but instead comes across more as fuzzy-brained and fond. At last John has Sherlock down to nothing but his pants. He decides against removing them.

Settled at last under the duvet, Sherlock is pale-faced and his hair a wild, dark storm against the pillow. He looks astonishing. John kisses him chastely on the forehead, but as he tries to straighten up again, Sherlock seizes his wrist, fingers as strong as they ever were.

“Stay,” he urges, sleep already slurring his words. “I’ll sleep better if you’re here.”

How could John possibly refuse him? He can’t. He takes off everything but his pants - well, _Sherlock’s_ pants - and climbs carefully into the bed beside him.

Within seconds, Sherlock’s fast asleep, and John lies quietly, happily, next to him.

* * * * * * * *

**_Sunday, April 21st - 1.30 am_ **

Sherlock awakes to the certain knowledge that John is dead. He saw him die. Saw him plummet and fall. Rushed over, tore the mask from his face, hoping - _praying_ \- that underneath it, he’d find someone else.

He didn’t.

At first, he can’t understand what he’s doing, still alive and warm in bed. Then he feels movement at his back and hears a sleepy voice mumble, “Sherlock?”

(John! It’s _John_! He’s not dead!)

Sherlock lies still, listening to the beautiful sound of John’s breathing, trying to let the miraculous expansion and contraction of his ribcage chase away the last remnants of his nightmare. (Blood. There was so much blood.) (And pain. And rage. And _incomprehension_ …)

He shivers a bit, despite the warmth, and peers into orange-tinged gloom around him, trying to find something solid to hang onto, to prove this is the real world, not some desperate fantasy. Slowly, the familiar lines of his room begin to soothe him. The metallic sheen of his bedside lamp (breathe). The glass panels in the bathroom door: one (it was a dream), two (John’s alive), three (John is _right next to you_ ).

An arm snakes around his waist and a body wriggles nearer. “You okay?”

(It’s so good to hear his voice.) “Fine.”

“Bad dream?”

Sherlock grunts. He doesn’t want to talk about it. Doesn’t trust himself not to get overwhelmed by _feelings_.

“Oh dear.” John kisses his shoulder blade. “I suppose it’s only to be expected after what you’ve been through. Would you like me to give you something? To help you sleep?”

(After what I’ve been through? _Oh_. He thinks I was dreaming about Pike!) Sherlock laughs. (As if I’d give that idiot a second’s thought - even unconscious!)

John misunderstands. “Modern hypnotics are very good-” he starts explaining, dotting more kisses over Sherlock’s back. “Very effective at-”

Sherlock cuts him off. “I wasn’t dreaming about _that_.”

John stills and the kisses stop. “ _Oh_.” (Oh god, now he thinks I was reliving my childhood trauma.) “Would you like to talk about it? We never have-”

“It wasn’t that. It was you. You jumped. From Bart’s roof. Died.” Sherlock swallows around an unexpected lump in his throat, and twists around to face him. “John … I’m sorry.”

John cradles his cheek in a gentle hand. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

(He’s wrong.) (Very, very wrong.) “No. I didn’t realize … I knew you’d be upset. I _needed_ you to be upset. I … I just didn’t realize how much it would _hurt_.” Sherlock squeezes his eyes shut, chest tightening painfully. “How bad it would be.”

John leans in, brushes his lips lightly against Sherlock’s and, even in the gloom, Sherlock can see his eyes are wet and extra-bright. “Are _you_ all right?” he whispers hoarsely.

John wraps an arm about his shoulders and pulls his head down to rest on his chest. “Fine,” John insists, and Sherlock feels him nod, even if he can’t see it; feels a kiss pressed to the top of his head. “Now, shut up and go to sleep.”

* * * * * * * *

**_8.30 am_ **

When Sherlock wakes again, it’s fully morning. John is lying beside him, and outside, despite Sunday supposedly being a day of rest, London is going noisily about its business. (If Heaven existed, it would be something like this.)

Sherlock rolls carefully onto his side, trying not to disturb John, but finds him awake already - and smiling.

“Good morning,” he says, touching Sherlock’s face. “How are you feeling?”

(Better.) (Grateful.) (Happy.) Sherlock kisses him - sleepy, warm and affectionate.

John pulls away before it has a chance to become anything more. “I’ll get you something to drink,” he says, throwing back the covers. “Don’t argue,” he warns, wagging a finger, as he takes Sherlock’s dressing gown from the hook on the back of the door and puts it on, “You need liquids.”

“All right, _Doctor_.” Sherlock tries to growl the words but the effect is more lion cub than alpha male. “So long as you promise to come back.”

“Do you promise to be here?” John’s question is gentle, but pointed.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Sherlock promises. “Ever again.”

John grins. “Glad to hear it. Tea? Coffee? Bit of toast?”

“Just tea for me.”

John nods, like a soldier acknowledging an order. “Coming up!”

Sherlock watches him go, wondering what he’s ever done to deserve him. To think that John doesn’t consider himself good enough! (Well, he’s always been an idiot.)

For a while, Sherlock lies still, luxuriating in being warm and comfortable and _home_ , but soon John’s absence becomes too much to tolerate, and he jumps out of bed, eager to drag him back into it. Annoyingly, when he steps out into the hallway, he hears Mrs Hudson speaking. (What’s she doing here? She needs to leave. Now.)

“Mrs Hudson!” he bellows. “Go away!”

“ _Sherlock_.” John’s answering voice carries a Please Don’t tone.

(Damn!) (Well, _he_ may be too soft-hearted to send her away but I’m not.)

Sherlock quickly puts his shirt and trousers on and, still fastening his belt, marches into the kitchen, ready to manhandle Mrs Hudson downstairs if she won’t go of her own accord. He’s finds her, one hand resting on the sliding doors, and directing three burly removal men around the living room with the other.

Sherlock looks at John, raising an eyebrow.

“My things,” John explains. “I’m assuming this is Mycroft’s doing.”

Sherlock narrows his eyes at the men lugging cardboard packing cases. (Clean-shaven, well-groomed. Pampered skin. Good clothes.) (John’s right.)

“Perhaps you should check, dear?” Mrs Hudson suggests to John. “See what you want them to put where?”

“No!” Sherlock explodes. “John can do that later. Right now - everybody out!”

Mycroft’s men gape at him.

“You heard,” he insists, pointing towards the door. “Out. OUT!”

The men exchange glances. One frowns, one rolls his eyes, and the third sighs but they set their cases down and leave.

“You too, Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock says, seizing her by the elbow and propelling her towards the door. “Off you go now. Go and buy yourself a scratchcard.”

She makes a few quavering sounds of protest, but Sherlock ignores them. At the door, she tries appealing to John with a look but he has the sense to shrug helplessly and shake his head, so at last she bustles away down the stairs, clucking indignantly about rude young men who need to mend their manners.

“You could have been a bit politer,” John scolds, when they’ve gone. “It’s not as if they were planning on staying.” But he’s smiling as he crosses the room to join Sherlock at the door, bare feet pulling slightly on the wooden flooring. Reaching up to kiss Sherlock’s mouth, he trails a hand down the front of his shirt, letting his fingertips come to rest on his belt. Slowly, he unbuckles it and slips it from its loops.

Sherlock’s stomach tightens, but instead of dropping the belt to the floor and moving on to unzip Sherlock’s flies as well, John steps back and carefully folds the belt in half. His eyes are dark and enormous as he places it in Sherlock’s hand.

Sherlock feels the hairs on his forearms and the back of his neck rise. He swallows. “John?”

John doesn’t answer, just unties his dressing gown, and lets it tumble to the floor in a pile of soft, blue silk. Underneath, he’s completely naked.

“What are you doing?” Sherlock’s voice is hoarse even to his own ears.

“Trusting you.”

For a moment, all Sherlock can do is stare at him, hearing his own heartbeat loud in his ears. The feel of the belt in his hand is terrifying. It’s supple, but good quality, substantial, and still warm from his body. (And, oh god, John wants me to use it on him.) Sherlock’s never struck anyone with a belt before, not even in a fight.

He needs a moment. To get himself under control. To think.

“The bedroom,” he says, the words like gravel in his dry mouth. “Now.”

With a single nod, John turns and goes back through the kitchen, calves flexing and lengthening with each step, thigh muscles shifting fluidly under creamy skin, his buttocks soft and rounded and …

( _God_.)

Sherlock’s cock starts to swell. He doesn’t want to feel aroused (not by _this_ ), but he is. He always is, no matter how happy he’d be to never do it again. He runs the belt (Paul Smith, Saffiano, navy) through his fingers, feeling the weight and texture of it, and slaps it experimentally against the palm of his hand. (Greater surface area than the crop - three centimetres - thus less likely to break skin.) (Except it has square edges.) (Plus, it’s longer and more flexible than the crop, therefore less predictable.) Sherlock doesn’t want to get this wrong, or do John real damage.

(Physics. Think about the physics of it.) (The longer the belt is, the more force it will deliver.) (Power is inversely proportional to accuracy.) (Probably.) (And accuracy _matters_.)

Sherlock opens the belt out and grips it just below the buckle. (The most dangerous part.) (Like a snake’s head.) (The world’s most venomous snakes-) (Stop thinking about _snakes_ and focus!) Winding the belt around his hand, he gives it a little flick and watches the way it extends and snaps back, as he frantically calculates strike and angle, speed and weight.

Practice. He needs practice, a target. John’s left a loaf of bread on the table - open but still in its plastic wrapper. Sherlock presses it with a thumb, testing its resilience. The crust is hard, the bread beneath it dense and firm. (It’ll do.) Sherlock pushes the teapot and mugs out of the way and sets the loaf in the middle of the open space. He draws his arm back, takes aim and strikes. The bread jumps. The thin, plastic wrapper shivers and rustles, but the loaf inside stays intact. Sherlock tries again, harder (John is tougher than a wholemeal loaf), aiming for the pricing paper label. He misses, adjusts his stance, and tries once more. This time, the belt slaps down square on the label, and knocks the loaf over with a thud. (Perfect!) Sherlock repeats the procedure again, until he can predict exactly where the belt will land, and how much force it takes to dent the crust and make it crumble.

He takes a deep breath. All right. Yes. He can do this.

* * * * * * * *

**_8.45 am_ **

John stands in the bedroom, waiting. He wonders if perhaps he ought to lie down, position himself somehow but in the end decides he’d rather leave the decision to Sherlock. For all sorts of reasons, it’s important that Sherlock takes control, and they always need a few moments first. Quiet moments of consent, given and taken; of preparation.

Even thinking about what comes next makes John’s cock start rising to attention. He hopes Sherlock won’t be long. He can hear him, banging about in the kitchen, and - his every sense already heightened - it’s impossible _not_ to hear what he’s banging about with. Each snap of leather, each shudder of table legs on the kitchen floor, builds John’s anticipation higher, making him harder still. By the time Sherlock finally appears in the doorway, the belt stretched tight between his hands, John’s erection is thick, flushed, and straining against his belly - and when Sherlock’s gaze meets John’s, it jumps.

Sherlock’s eyes are hooded, unsmiling, the line of his mouth and the set of his shoulders determined. John’s stomach flips over. God, he’s missed this. Missed _him_.

Sherlock stalks into the room, tall, thin and predatory, his eyes roving from the wall by the door where his poster of the Periodic Table should be, to the window, the shelving unit, the chest of drawers-

“Bed,” he says, sharply. “Face down.”

John would hurry to obey if his legs were working properly. Instead, he manages a sort of stumble towards it, and half-falls onto his front. He stretches out, flat on his stomach, silently cursing the damn softness of the bedding and the way it provides bugger all in the way of friction for his eager cock, but he manfully resists the temptation to try thrusting into the mattress.

Sherlock comes closer. Leans over John and pulls both pillows out from under the top of the duvet. “Under your hips. Both of them.”

This is new - as unfamiliar as the belt. It makes John’s abdomen tighten and his pulse race. He shoves the pillows under his belly, skin tingling with excitement at the change of angle, the shift in pressure.

Sherlock sits down on the edge of the bed and runs a hand down from John’s shoulders to the small of his back, an exquisite kind of torture that makes John want to writhe and cry out. He feels his whole body grow tense and he has to bite his lip to stifle a groan, but Sherlock just carries on, right down the length of John’s spine, his hand light over his buttocks and gentle on his thighs.

“You find this _really hard_ ,” Sherlock murmurs, for a moment sounding amazed, as if - despite being a genius - he’d never realized that before. “Ah … Of _course_ you do. You’d never have made captain - or become a doctor - if you found giving in easy.” He strokes his hand back up John’s left thigh, cups the buttock and squeezes.

John squirms a little. The pillows, this odd position, have already made him feel even more vulnerable than usual, without Sherlock peering into his head as well. Half of him wants to run away and hide, but the other half is craving more - more discovery, more exposure - to be spread out like a sample on one of Sherlock’s microscope slides, completely known, completely-

“In fact,” Sherlock continues, his voice soft, and deep, and hypnotic, “this is nearly impossible for you. Look at you. You’re trembling.”

John buries his face in the duvet and groans.

“Too much unused adrenalin. Warring desires. You want to run …” Sherlock pauses, gets to his feet, and adds, in a deep, knowing rumble, “But you want to stay more.”

Suddenly John feels a wave of sympathy for all the thieves and murderers and general bastards they’ve helped put away, because this must be what it feels like when Sherlock unpicks a case: Sherlock unravelling him - shining a light into the darkest corners of his psyche. Taking his heart out and showing it to him.

“I always thought you surrendered so easily,” Sherlock muses, using the tail of belt to trace slow horizontal lines across John’s arse. “All I had to do what shove you up against a wall, or undo your trousers - but you don’t. You don’t because it scares you. That’s what’s so thrilling about it, isn’t it?”

Face still buried in the duvet, John groans again. He’d forgotten how good Sherlock is at drawing it out. What a brilliant performance he gives. “Sherlock-”

A drawer in the bedside table scrapes open and, as John turns his head to see what’s happening, Sherlock’s hand appears in front of his face, a pair of handcuffs danging from his long fingers.

“If I put these on you,” he says, “it would make it easier.”

John nods helplessly into the bedding. It would, he knows. He could hand over not just control but responsibility too.

“But you don’t want me to, do you?”

John swallows. “No.”

“No, of course not,” Sherlock murmurs, and John pictures him looking down at him, nodding to himself at this new knowledge, as John lies rigid with anticipation, scarcely able to breathe.

The handcuffs fall from Sherlock’s hand, bounce once and come to rest inches from John’s nose. Meanwhile, the line of Sherlock’s body, dark out of the corner of John’s eye, retreats, and moves out of sight.

John tenses. Braces. Grips handfuls of duvet, and exhales.

There’s a moment of utter stillness - then a whoosh as the air above him moves. First comes the snap - the sound alone makes him start and dig his knees into the mattress - then a sudden, fierce sting that steals John’s breath away. Not pain, but heat. John moans and presses his hips into the pillows, cock as hot as the burning stripe Sherlock’s just laid across his arse.

 _Turning him away_ , John tells himself, clenching his jaw against the throbbing in his buttocks, and the rush of want it sends through him. But he doesn’t let himself move, not yet. No rubbing, no grinding, no anything until-

The belt cracks down again, hitting exactly the same patch of skin, and John gasps, clutching at the bedding. _Leading Mary on_.

The third strike falls almost immediately, the heat of it almost white in John’s mind, and blinding. For a moment, it’s all consuming - a thin, sharp strip of hurt. But it too fades quickly into warmth - a low, sweet burning - because Sherlock is as brilliant at this as he is at everything else. _Being angry with him._

And now Sherlock stops. He walks around to the other side the bed, the sound of his bare feet of the floorboards so light that John only hears it because Sherlock’s not just the emotional centre of his world but only thing in it just now.

“Are you all right?” Sherlock asks, offering John an opportunity he doesn’t want.

John nods, and the belt lands again, from a different angle, finding cool, previously untouched skin and sending one, two, three streaks of fire across it. _Letting Moran know he was back in London._ Something twists painfully in John’s chest and the last of his resistance breaks. Sod pride. Sod dignity. When Sherlock brings the belt down again, John allows a cry of relief to escape his tight throat and he lets the muscles he’s been holding taut go limp. _Not being good enough for him._

“ ‘Not good enough’ ,” Sherlock says softly, as though John had said it out loud. “You’re an idiot.” The belt drops to the floor with a clatter, and John feels Sherlock climb onto the bed beside him. There’s a soothing hand on the back of his neck, fingertips stroking up through the short hair there. “Turn over.”

Slowly, reluctantly, John turns. This is always the worst bit. The bit when he expects to see pity, or disgust, or ridicule, on Sherlock’s face but there’s none of that. All he can see is want, and desire. _Need_.

“Sherlock,” he murmurs, reaching up for him. “God, I-”

“Yes,” Sherlock agrees, and their mouths meet perfectly, Sherlock’s already open, his tongue seeking John’s, the pressure of his lips certain and firm firm.

John arches beneath him. It’s only the start of a kiss, but already, it’s undoing him. He wraps a leg around Sherlock’s thighs, drags him down. And now Sherlock’s on top of him, a blissful, beautiful, constraining weight as he curves his pelvis into him, pushes and rocks.

“John-”

“Take your clothes off,” John urges, pushing him back a little, so that he can help.

Sherlock sits back on his heels and tears off his shirt. Rises to his knees, unzips his trousers, and shoves them down over his hips, his pants going with them. For the briefest of moments, John gets a glimpse of that long, elegant cock - and how very hard it is - then Sherlock has snatched his jaw between his thumb and forefinger, and is kissing him breathlessly, sucking John’s tongue into his mouth and caressing it with his own, as he struggles one-handedly to rid himself of his clothes entirely. He can’t quite manage it and is forced to let John go again so that he can support himself on his hand and first one knee, then the other, to kick his trouser legs clear of his ankle. He’s panting now, but smiling - triumphantly - and he grabs John’s face once more, kissing him as though his life depended on it.

John tries not to claw at him, or yank on his hair too hard, but - bloody hell - he’s waited long enough for this, not just last night and this morning, but for his whole life - and he can’t wait much longer. He buries his fingers into the curls at the back of Sherlock’s head, and reaches down between their bodies to seize Sherlock’s cock and tug on it. Sherlock catches his breath, makes a low growling sound at the back of his throat and swiftly reciprocates. It’s not long before they’re both shaking and finding it hard to breathe.

“Stop,” Sherlock groans, his eyes wonderfully dark and unfocused, and John can’t resist giving him a last little squeeze. It sends Sherlock’s eyes rolling back in their sockets for a moment before he recovers control of himself and slaps John’s hand away.

The bedside drawer is still open. Sherlock pushes up and reaches into it. Takes out a tube of lubricant.

“Let me help,” John grins, trying to snatch it from his hands, but Sherlock whisks it away, and holds it just out of reach.

“Help?” he asks, eyes crinkling with the beginnings of a smile. “Help how?”

“Oh, you know,” John improvises. “I thought I could get my hands all slippery with it - slipperier - and then stroke it onto you. Slowly. _Painfully_ slowly. Until you were begging for mercy.”

“Ah.” Sherlock nods. “As I predicted. You’ve never been the most original of thinkers, John-”

“Oi!” John protests, smacking his arm.

Sherlock grins. Leans in and kisses him. “I’m merely stating the facts - not complaining about your methods. After all, they _do_ have a certain efficiency to them-”

“Are you going to shag me any time soon?” John grumbles.

Sherlock smiles down warmly at him. “Consider the evidence. Erect penis. One tube of lubricant. Which I’m currently opening. Care to make a deduction?”

“Not without more evidence,” John begins playfully, only to forget all the clever things he was going to say about it being a mistake to jump to conclusions when Sherlock begins coating his fingers - taking his time over it, sliding the jelly slowly up and down, then up again. “I, uh … well, you might be planning to … to fix the runner on that drawer. It makes a terrible-” Sherlock lies down his side next to him, and hooks his right leg over John’s, his eyes dark and purposeful as he eases his thighs apart. “ - a terrible, uh, um, scraping noise,” John finishes in a breathless babble.

“Or,” Sherlock replies, his voice deep and sultry now, his slicked-up hand making its way relentlessly up between John’s legs, “I could be about to do this.” His timing is perfect, a single finger pressing into John at the exact moment the sentence ends.

John feels his bones melt, his cock twitch.

“And this,” Sherlock purrs as pressure - careful and frustratingly light - applied to John’s prostate makes him arch and his hips stutter.

“Sherlock …”

Sherlock withdraws the finger, slides it in again, presses harder. “Of course, this might be _all_ I’m going to do. Observation, John. Data. Go on - tell me what you think.”

John opens his mouth - there must be some clever-dick answer he can come up with to wipe the smirk off Sherlock’s face - but as soon as he tries to speak, Sherlock has two fingers inside him, then three, and is thrusting them with mercilessly precision. “Can’t …” John manages at last. “Think …”

Sherlock doesn’t let up, but smiles and kisses him.

“Christ,” John groans against his mouth, unable to keep from writhing now, “You’re a bloody machine … How can you …? Oh, for fuck’s sake! Don’t you want to ..?”

“ _Shag_ you?” Sherlock asks, somehow managing to raise a cool eyebrow, despite having his fingers buried deep inside John and being every bit as hard as John is. “Of course I do. You’re really quite … interesting to me.”

“Then, please … stop pissing about!” Bloody hell, what does John have to do? He cants his hips, rolls them, clenches his buttocks, groans. He’s had, well, _several_ lovers in his time, and none of them has been like this. None. Ever. As if there wasn’t enough to love Sherlock for already.

At long, sodding last, Sherlock takes the hint. He pulls his fingers from John’s arse, kisses him hard, and forces his legs up and apart. And, as John lies, folded almost in half, he feels the fingers that were inside him move to Sherlock’s cock, smoothing what’s left of the lube onto it, as Sherlock lines himself up.

Even though he’s expecting it - even though he knows what it will feel like - John still gasps when Sherlock pushes inside him. His legs clamp reflexively around Sherlock’s body, and he pants, shifts and moans his name. Sherlock’s eyes find his for an instant, then close. “God, John,” he whispers.

“Yeah,” John whispers back. “ _God_.”

Finally - _finally_ \- there’s no teasing. Sherlock drives into him, his narrow hips bony and sharp between John’s spread thighs. Bones knock. Skin slaps. Fluids make all kinds of uncivilized noises. But it all recedes, fading away as pleasure sparks through John’s body, light and brilliant and right. He never thought it possible to love like this.

“Sherlock …”

“Yes,” Sherlock answers. Emphatically. He thrusts hard again and shivers. “ _Yes_.” His arms give way and, as he allows himself to sink down onto John, John wraps himself about him more tightly, riding tantalizing little ripples of pleasure as Sherlock twitches and sighs in his embrace.

“That was extraordinary,” Sherlock breathes, when he finally comes back to himself.

“All right, all right,” John chides. He pushes a couple of damp curls from Sherlock’s face. “There’s no need to overdo it. I mean, I’m glad you’re happy, but ‘extraordinary’?”

Sherlock gives him a knowing smile. “You haven’t climaxed yet - I’ll show you.” He pulls out of John carefully and stretches out beside him, an arm around his shoulders to hold him close, as slowly and determinedly he sets about wanking him off. All John has to do - all he’ll let John do - is lie back, and be pleasured. It’s odd at first - John’s so used to taking care of Sherlock, being so passive makes him feels lazy and guilty - but before long, he’s too far gone to care. His cock is in Sherlock’s hand - Sherlock’s firm and fast-moving hand. And - god - it’s not just relentless but unpredictable too, giving little twists when John least expects them, thumb flicking lightly at the head. John’s muscles stiffen. His head tips back. He’s right on the edge now. Hardly a thought in his head. Nothing but sensation and tingling skin. His throat’s tight, his balls tighter and his pelvis is vibrating with the need to thrust. Then, just when he thinks he can’t resist the urge any longer, Sherlock speaks to him.

“John. Tell me.”

John blinks his eyes open. He hadn’t even realized they were closed. “Tell you?” he pants. “Tell you what?”

Sherlock kisses him, softly, speeding up the movement of his hand on John’s cock. “Tell me.”

“Oh,” John gasps, finally understanding. “I-” The words are on his lips. He wants to say them but when he opens his mouth, he finds can’t. He’s too lost, too breathless. It doesn’t matter: even just imagining himself saying them, sends an electric charge through him that makes him thrust into Sherlock’s hand, and then he’s coming, hard and uncontrolled and shuddering from the force of it.

From somewhere, far away, he hears Sherlock chuckle and feels a kiss pressed to his forehead.

“See?” Sherlock’s asks, his voice soft, and tender, and _proud_. “I told you. Extraordinary.”

* * * * * * * *

_**9.35am** _

John has been asleep for twenty-three minutes. (He has a tendency to doze off after sex.) (This time was a new record - just fifty-two seconds after orgasm.) Sherlock has spent the entire time watching him - a pleasure he hadn’t realized he’d missed until now. Seeing him so relaxed, so comfortable in his presence, does strange things to Sherlock’s chest. A bittersweet tension that’s half pleasure, half pain.

John is sprawled on his back, his face turned towards Sherlock; one arm seemingly reaching for him, even in sleep. All the little lines on his forehead and around his eyes have smoothed out, and he’s almost - though not quite - snoring, lips parting with a soft puff each time he exhales. (He looks loose in every limb, sated and completely at peace with the world.)

( _Is_ he peaceful?) Sudden doubt makes Sherlock heart beat faster. (Look at the evidence!) Slow, steady breathing. No frown lines. No muscular tension. Sleep. (All indicative of peacefulness.) (And John _ought_ to be peaceful. The thing with the belt - that was a promise.) (Commitment.) (How could he _not_ be peaceful after that?)

Sherlock wonders if he’s peaceful too. Before John, he was certain caring was a disadvantage; often enough _with_ him too. (Relationships are difficult, bordering on impossible. Too many variables, too little hard data. And far too many conflicting goals.) Sherlock considers the odd fluttering sensation between his breastbone and his throat, the almost irresistible pull he feels towards John. (No, whatever this feeling is, it’s not peace.) (It’s fear. Excitement. Helplessness. Perpetual discomfort.) The irony of it is, now that Sherlock’s had John, he knows being without him would be so much worse. His gaze fall on the handcuffs - just visible beneath the edge of John’s pillow - and they strike him as so ridiculously appropriate, he’s unable hold back a wry laugh.

Immediately, John stirs. Snuffles and grunts. Rolls onto his side and rubs at his face, blinking into wakefulness again. His eyes dart about Sherlock’s face and, when they meet Sherlock’s, they crease up in a warm smile.

“What are _you_ grinning about?” he asks, flipping Sherlock’s arm with the back of his hand.

Sherlock tugs the handcuffs out across the bed and shows him. “These.”

All of a sudden, John stiffens and frowns.

His change of mood is worrying. (Why is he frowning? _Why_?) Sherlock hurriedly props himself up on an elbow to get a better look at him. “What is it? What’s wrong?” He doesn’t think he did John any serious damage, but he’s never sure: once his own arousal kicks in, it’s Goodnight Vienna, as far as his critical faculties are concerned. “Did I … Are you all right?”

John sighs. “Don’t ruin it.”

“Ruin it? Ruin _what_? How am I ruining anything? What are you talking about?” (God, being this clueless is hateful!)

John strokes a hand down Sherlock’s arm, and curls his fingers around Sherlock’s. “Look,” he says, squeezing gently, “I know you mean well, but can we not behave as if it’s a problem? Can we just accept it’s something we both like every now and again, and that that’s fine? Because - oddly enough - I don’t like the idea of you thinking I’m a weirdo. So, if you don’t get something out of it too-”

“I _do_!” Sherlock interrupts - so forcefully that John looks at him in surprise. Sherlock’s quite surprised himself. He wasn’t planning on laying his soul bare. (Why not? It’s long overdue.) (Stop being pathetic. _Tell_ him.) Staring down at the bedsheets, Sherlock pokes at the handcuffs with finger. “Actually, I’m - uh - grateful for it.”

“Grateful?” John sounds unconvinced. “How?”

“You were right,” Sherlock answers, quietly - too quietly. He tries again, louder. “You were right. What you said the other night. About how we wouldn’t be in a relationship at all if I didn’t think … It was a long time ago, John, and it was stupid. _I_ was stupid.”

John instantly realizes what he’s talking about and, as Sherlock lifts his gaze again, he sits up, all eyes and quiet attention. “D’you want to tell me?” he asks, softly.

Sherlock swallows. Nods. “You’re going to laugh,” he warns. (Because it’s risible.) (Other people suffer far worse things.)

“No,” John insists sternly. “I won’t. I love you.”

(Hell. Did he _have_ to say that?) Sherlock wishes he hadn’t, because now he has to close his eyes, in an attempt to stave off what feels horribly like the beginning of tears. (No. Not going to cry. There’s nothing to cry _about_.)

“It was summer. We were at the beach. I was eleven and bored out of my mind. Mummy had fallen asleep. Mycroft was reading. I would have been reading too, except we were outside, and sand was getting everywhere. Grit in every crease.” He shudders. “The sun was too bright and I was too hot. Sweating. I wanted to go home, get clean.”

John nods.

“Anyway, I got up. Wandered about a bit. And then …”

“Yes?”

“I saw … someone. A man. He smiled at me. People didn’t smile at me, John. Ever. They sighed, or rolled their eyes, or laughed. But he … smiled.”

John doesn’t say a word, but a subtle change comes over him - a kind of quiet fury, that makes his eyes flash and his nostrils flare.

“He was tall and blond. He seemed … nice.” Sherlock gives a bitter laugh. “I’d always been good at reading people - too good, Mummy said. I thought I could trust my own judgement.”

John’s hand closes around Sherlock’s more firmly. Out on Baker Street a police car goes screeching past, siren wailing.

“I didn’t realize I wasn’t operating on my ability to judge and analyze. That something was happening to me that hadn’t happened before …”

The muscles along John’s jawline flex and bulge. (He’s struggling to keep silent, even though he dearly wants to speak.) Sherlock’s torn. He wants John to rescue him, to derail him from the tracks of this painful confession so he doesn’t have to admit what an idiot he was. But, just as strongly, he wants to get it over with.

“I went with him, John. Into the darkness under the pier.” Sherlock’s mouth feels as gritty as the beach that day, his eyes as salty and damp. He looks away. “He didn’t force me. I …” He stops. Swallows again. Coughs out the words. “I let him touch me.”

He flicks a sideways look at John. (What’s he thinking now? His face is giving nothing away.)

“Go on,” John says quietly.

“At first, it was … nice.” (’Nice’? _Again_? Is there a more spinelessly vague word in the English language?) “I _liked_ it. It felt good. But then-” Sherlock stops, remembering the arm he’d been happy to have draped over his shoulders suddenly dropping to his his waist and tugging him deeper into the shadows. Remembers the hand that forced itself into his swimming trunks and the other one, on the back of his head, shoving it down-

“Then it didn’t feel good at all,” John supplies, nodding. “The bastard.”

Sherlock grips one of the handcuff bracelets, hard. “It was my fault. I should never have-”

“Christ, Sherlock! You were _eleven_!”

“But I was still _me_! Observant, analytical, highly intelligent. I should have known.”

“Nobody’s very intelligent when they're awash with hormones. Especially not pubescent boys. Just because you were attracted to him, it doesn’t mean he had any right-”

“Mycroft had to rescue me,” Sherlock continues, skin crawling with shame. “You can imagine how stupid that made me feel.”

The ghost of a smile plays over John’s lips but he nods seriously. “I’ve got an idea, yes.”

“And the fussing! It was unbearable. He spent the next fortnight watching me, constantly asking if I was all right, and trying to persuade me to tell Mummy, so that she could go to the police.”

“You never told her?”

Sherlock shakes his head. “She had enough problems of her own. I didn’t want to add to them.”

“What about your father?”

“He … By then, my father didn’t think much of me. He could scarcely bear to look at me. Besides, six months after it happened, he left us.”

“Oh, Sherlock,” John sighs, pained. “Someone should have helped you deal with it.”

“But he didn’t … I mean, there was nothing to deal _with_ \- other than my own stupidity. So I made a decision: I would never allow myself to get into that position again. I would never to give in to _feelings_ , or what my body wanted. I trained myself to do without food, without sleep, without friends. And it worked.”

“Weren’t you lonely?”

Sherlock shrugs. “I was alone. Alone protected me. And it was better than the alternative. Better than being weak. Better than letting my mind rot. But then -” He picks up the handcuffs again and starts fiddling with them, trying to calm himself with the smoothness of the metal, the interesting little crinkle of the chain. “- then you walked into the lab at Bart’s.”

John gives a self-deprecating laugh. “If you’re expecting me to believe one look at me changed all that-”

“No, of course, I’m not. At first glance, you seemed ordinary. Safe. No, don’t be offended. I said ‘seemed’, not ‘were’. There’s a world of difference.”

“You decided I’d make a good flatmate because I seemed ‘ordinary’.”

“Exactly. And you held yourself like a soldier. Self-contained. Reserved. When I asked you whether you’d been in Afghanistan or Iraq, you bristled - which told me you were someone who valued his own privacy and would respect mine.”

“Well, you were right there. _You’re_ the one who started inviting me out on cases with you, borrowing my things, _touching_ me …”

“Believe me, if I’d seen it coming, I’d have gone straight back to the mortuary and stayed there until you were safely out of the way. That first night, I only took you with me to Lauriston Gardens to annoy Anderson, and I was perfectly fine - right up until the moment I realized you were the one who’d fired the gun. You’d protected me - but instead of using it to take advantage, you tried to deny it. You didn’t _want_ anything from me. So much changed in that moment, John. I started noticing you. _Really_ noticing you. How funny you were, how strong. Your eyes, the way you lick your lips, the way you smile …”

“Not so ordinary after all, huh?” John smiles.

Sherlock looks at him. Takes in his eyes, his face - his scarred, soldier’s shoulder. He touches it lightly, a little frisson of want tickling its way up his spine. “The opposite.”

“Right, so you liked me. Even then. So why didn’t you-”

“I wanted to - but I couldn’t. I didn’t trust anyone. Least of all myself. _Liking_ you was bad enough. Unsettling. I wasn’t the world’s only consulting detective any more: I was that strange kid nobody liked again - the who knew too much and broke things. It would have been so much easier if you’d told me to piss off like everyone else - but no, you were dazzled by me. Openly impressed. It made me want to keep impressing you. To have you call me brilliant and astonishing all the time. But sex wasn’t _my_ area - it was yours. I knew I’d only disappoint you, so-”

“You’re such a dick,” John interrupts fondly. “I’m not an idiot. I knew you weren’t experienced. It didn’t bother me. Didn’t you realize that?”

“That made it _worse_. It gave you all the power.”

John’s eyes go round and wide. “ _Me_? I had all the power? God, I wish I’d known.”

Sherlock fiddles with the handcuffs some more. Clears his throat. “It was only when I finally realized that you liked … that you wanted me to be rough with you, that I saw a way of taking some of it back. And the beauty of it was, I could give _you_ something at the same time. But I hadn’t factored in the effect doing … _that_ \- the effect of you _wanting_ me to do that - would have on me. I felt something I hadn’t experienced before, John: pure, unadultered lust. By the time I was finished, I couldn't have cared less whether I was going to disappoint you - I just wanted you.”

John grins. “And the rest is history. Filthy, dirty, erotic history.”

(Look at him. He’s perfect.) “Exactly.” Sherlock smiles. “And probably inevitable. When you consider how alike we are.”

“What?” John laughs, incredulous. “How am _I_ like _you_? I’m placid and straightforward, remember? My mind’s hardly used, whereas _yours_ is like a rocket-”

“I’m not talking about your IQ,” Sherlock snaps impatiently, because he can feel his brain making new connections, finding links between apparently disparate data and making patterns. (It’s interesting. John needs to be quiet and listen.) “I’m talking about _emotions_.”

“Really? _You_?” John folds his arms and leans back against the headboard. “This should be interesting.” 

(All right. I’ll prove it to him.) “You don’t trust people either. No - don’t deny it. We both know it’s true. Mycroft even has it on file. You _like_ people, you’re kind to them, friendly and polite - all the things ‘nice’ people are supposed to be - and yet you always keep a bit yourself back.”

John’s eyes have widened, and his sceptical expression has lost some of its certainty. (I’m right. He knows I’m right.)

“You don't use being nice to get closer to people,” Sherlock continues, nodding to himself, as more and more things start making sense, “but to keep them at bay. You can’t let them in. Most likely because your self-image is so distorted.”

“Are you calling me big-headed?” John asks. “Because - pot; kettle.”

(He’s starting to sound annoyed. Is he annoyed? Why is he annoyed?)

“I’m saying you underestimate yourself,” Sherlock hurries to explain. “You think people couldn’t possibly like you if they knew the real you. Yet, deep down, you’ve always had a yearning to belong. It's a common enough phenomenon in people from dysfunctional families. And it’s one of the reasons you joined the army. Why you were so lost without it. Why you moved in with me, instead of living on your own. You want to belong to someone, John.”

John leans forward again, stretching one side of his neck, then the other, like a wrestler, preparing for a fight. “And now we’re right back to you thinking I’m a weirdo,” he says, bitterly.

“No,” Sherlock insists. “Not at all. It’s … something I've discovered I have some sympathy with.”

John rolls his eyes. “Yeah, right.” 

(Damn! How can I convince him ..? Oh!) Sherlock’s pulse starts beating rapidly and he clicks open one of the handcuff bracelets. “John - put these on me.”

John blinks. “ _What?_ Why?”

“Because you’re not a weirdo. Well, no more than I am. Which, admittedly, a lot of people would think isn’t saying much.” He twists around and lays both hands and the cuffs in John’s lap. “I want to belong too.”

To Sherlock’s relief, he hears John catch his breath at the declaration, but looking down at handcuffs, he shakes his head. “I can’t.”

(Can’t? Why?) ( _Oh_.) He’s looking at the red marks left by Carey’s handcuffs. They’ve faded but they’re still visible.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sherlock snorts. “It’s not the same. I _want_ you to.”

John sits frozen, staring down at Sherlock’s wrists. “I still can’t-”

“Hell!” Sherlock growls. “Then I will.” He snaps the first cuff around his left wrist easily; the second around his right with a bit of fumbling. “There!” Smiling at John, who looks utterly shell-shocked, he loops his bound hands over his head and pulls him close, kissing his forehead, his nose, his lips. “Take me, John. I’m yours.”

(John’s never been the most poetic of souls but even he can read the symbolism in the gesture.) For a moment, he does nothing, just gazes deep into Sherlock’s eyes. Then he laughs. “You daft sod.”

“Now, John,” Sherlock reproves, primly. “We can’t giggle. It’s a sex scene.”

That makes John laugh again (such a wonderful sound) and finally Sherlock gets kissed properly. He closes his eyes, and lets the pressure of John’s lips and the slide of his tongue take him over completely. (No thinking. Just feeling.) (Swim. Float. Soar.)

John is very, very careful. He lifts Sherlock’s arms up and ducks out his embrace to push him back gently onto the bed, his hands on him the whole time - warm and strong and certain. They caress his chest, his shoulders, and arms, whilst John presses random kisses over his skin, burying his nose in it and making soft sounds of happy satisfaction as he inhales. 

“John-” Sherlock murmurs, lifting his cuffed hands to John’s head in an attempt to get him to pick up the pace (being worshipped is all very well, so long as it’s done _right_ ), but John shakes his head, tongue moving over the same spots his lips have just been kissing - licking, flicking and teasing, until at last the point of it finds Sherlock’s left nipple. The electric tingle goes straight to his cock, making him twitch and roll his hips, eager for more. “John, I want you to-”

“No,” John whispers hoarsely. “You’re trusting me, remember? Put your hands above your head and lie still.” 

Sherlock hesitates. He’s almost always the one in charge when it comes to sex. Partly because it feels safer that way, but mostly because it’s for _John_. A way of taking care of him. Out of the blue, something Mycroft said the last time they met comes back to Sherlock, replaying clearly in his head. _John may enjoy you being firm with him from time to time, but he’s still a man, with a man’s need to take care of those he loves._ Sherlock raises his hands above his head and lies still. It earns him a grateful, happy smile.

John retreats further down the bed, his hands moving to Sherlock’s hipbones, holding them firmly as he keeps up the steady pattern of kiss-lick-tease from Sherlock’s chest to his abdomen, moving slowly but inexorably south. 

As if he had all the time in the world, John kisses his way down the hollow between Sherlock’s right hipbone and his belly. The already taut muscles there grow tighter still and Sherlock has to hold his breath as John does the same again, down the other side. Each time, his mouth comes agonizingly close to Sherlock’s erection - so close Sherlock can feel the warm moisture of his breath - but, each time, John stops short of actually touching it. Sherlock groans, arms flexing uselessly against the handcuffs, ready to beg if he has to. “ _John_ …”

His pitiful tone has the opposite effect to the one he was hoping for: John moves from straddling him off to one side. (What _the hell_?) Sherlock opens his eyes, indignant.

John just chuckles. “All right, all right. Don’t get your knickers in a twist. Not that you’re wearing any but -” He chuckles again for a moment, then adopts a much more intent expression - unsmiling and focused. “Spread your legs,” he says in a tone that (finally!) means business.

Sherlock’s cock jumps at the note of command in it and heat flares in his pelvis. He opens his thighs hurriedly, and John climbs between them.

“Bend your knees,” John says, hunting around in the bedding beside them. “Soles of your feet flat on the bed.”

Sherlock complies, just as John succeeds in retrieving the tube of lubricant from a fold in the duvet with a victorious grin. He coats his fingers until they glisten then, out of Sherlock’s line of vision (frustratingly), does the same with his cock.

Sherlock wonders what he’s let himself in for. (There’s trust, and there’s _trust_.) Perhaps he should have specified.

A warm, slippery hand cups his balls, rolling them around the palm, as with his other hand, John prises Sherlock’s cock out from his belly, and Sherlock groans, pushing his hips up, pleading for more. John rises to his knees, curves his body down over Sherlock’s and takes him into his mouth. (Oh god.) Sherlock zones out for a moment, lost in the pleasure of it. The instinct to thrust, to get deeper is overwhelming, and resisting it makes him tremble all over. He clenches his jaw, screws his hands into fists and tries simply to breathe.

Humming (no, _purring_ ), John moves his head languorously, tongue swirling around Sherlock’s cock as he slowly lowers it; then exerting hard, sucking pressure as he draws his mouth up again. The combination of tiny vibrations and relentless pull make Sherlock’s nerve endings tingle and burn, not just in his cock, but everywhere, and just when he thinks he can’t stand any more - that John caressing his balls and sucking him off at the same time is too much, and he’ll have to move - two fingers slide purposefully inside him. It’s no good: he can’t help arching now, he _can’t_. His head slams back, his shoulders too, and his hips lift from the bed. He’s starting to unravel and it’s glorious. He arches again, moaning, and a ripple of movement engulfs him. (John’s laughing, pleased with himself.) (Oh god, and now he’s doing it again.) Sherlock had no idea someone else’s amusement could feel so good. Somewhere nearby, he hears another laugh, giddy and incredulous: his own.

But he can’t laugh for long: John’s as good with his fingers as he is with his mouth. (And he’s a doctor, which is - Oh! Oh _god_. Damn, that’s perfect - hardly fair.) John is pressing lightly on Sherlock’s prostate now, fingertips rubbing in teasing little circles, just enough to make Sherlock tense up at the prospect of the lightning bolts he knows are coming.

John’s mouth starts to move in time with his fingers, and Sherlock has to struggle not to fall apart. His pelvis doesn’t seem to know where it wants to be - thrusting into John’s mouth, or driving down on his fingers. It leaves him rocking desperately between the two, cursing John incoherently for his refusal to go faster, or harder, or deeper, at all.

“John,” he tries, gasping for breath. “For god’s sake … John …”

The movement of John’s fingers slows and the tightness of his mouth slackens off. Sherlock would grumble if he weren’t feeling so weak and needy. The fingers come out altogether and John crawls up the bed, cheeks flushed and lips swollen.

“Legs up,” he murmurs, against Sherlock’s mouth. “Tight around my waist.”

Weakly, Sherlock stirs, lifting one leg, then the other, to lock his ankles around John’s back.

“All right?” John asks, touching his face.

“Never … better,” Sherlock grits out, trying not to writhe, because - _fuck!_ \- he’s so close. (Why won’t John _get on with it_?)

“Just so you know,” John replies raggedly, eyes squeezing shut as he guides his cock into Sherlock’s body, “I’m taking that as a challenge.”

“Good,” Sherlock answers, the end of the word losing its shape when John starts to move. He lifts his arms and encircles John with them once more. “Though I should - warn you - oh, god, yes, there, _there_ \- I’m used to the best.”

John grins. Kisses him. “Raising the stakes, huh? All right. Don’t say you didn’t ask for it.”

His next thrust takes Sherlock’s breath away. Hits his prostate square on. An electric jolt that makes Sherlock shudder and cling to him, muscles clamping around him so hard that John groans. Another thrust; another struggle to breathe. Again and again - until Sherlock’s body isn’t his own any more but John’s. Focused on him entirely, sparking with life at every movement, shimmering with every touch.

(John’s hand. I need his hand. Now.)

John stills. Pulls back. 

Confused, Sherlock forces his eyes towards him. “What?”

John reaches down between them and wraps a hand around Sherlock’s cock. (Oh, thank god: he’s _observed_. At last.) But there’s no movement, no stroking and no pulling; no friction of any kind. “This time,” John says urgently. “I want you to say it. Out loud. In words.”

For a moment, Sherlock’s too strung out to have any idea what he’s talking about. 

“Say it,” John says again, voice rough with unsatisfied desire, clumps of hair sticking to his damp forehead. “Go on. You never have.”

“You first,” Sherlock bargains, rocking his hips a little (because John’s sweating too. Shaking and hanging on by a thread.)

“All right. _I’ve_ got no problem with saying it. I love you. I love you. I. Love. You.” A tremor goes through John, his arms judder and he grimaces, as if in pain, but he holds on. “Your turn. Say it.”

Sherlock’s not sure he can. Not sure he wants to. Before, just _thinking_ it was enough to undo him utterly. He meets John’s gaze, holds it and John looks back at him - patient, smiling, his eyebrows raised. 

(Oh god, he’s so _hopeful_.)

Sherlock licks his lips. “John, I …”

“Yes?”

“Oh, hell, John. I love you, all right? I-”

Sherlock doesn’t get the chance to say it again. John spares him that indignity by driving into him, hard and fast, hand working Sherlock’s cock to the same frantic rhythm. Sherlock’s balls pull up, tingling, the tension in his belly becoming more than he can possibly contain. He feels it spiral; the sinuous, powerful coils of impending orgasm, trapped within the confines of his pelvic bones. But his bones are only bones. They weaken and melt with the heat of it, and suddenly the coils snap together. Sherlock arches again, gasping for breath, as the tension finally breaks and leaves him shuddering with pleasure.

“Love …” he pants out, going limp. “You.”

John’s mouth finds his, kisses it - wet and clumsy, and then he’s coming too, biting down on Sherlock’s shoulder and growling his name.

This time, it takes Sherlock far longer than usual to recover. He lies, exhausted and reeling, in an awkward tangle of his own limbs and John’s, with John’s head resting on his chest long after he’s pulled out of him.

It’s finally John who stirs. “Tea,” he mumbles. “Didn’t I promise you tea a while back?”

“Ages ago,” Sherlock answers, shifting arms and legs so that John can move away and sit up.

John leans over and kisses him softly. “That was your fault. You distracted me.”

“ _I_ distracted you?” Sherlock scoffs. “ _You_ distracted _me_.”

John opens his mouth, as if to argue, but then thinks better of it. He traces a finger down the side of Sherlock’s face. “Are you all right?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well, you did just tell me that you love me.”

“So? You're very loveable.”

John laughs. “You never cease to amaze me, d’you know that?”

Warmth spreads through Sherlock’s chest. “Good.” He feels happier than he has in months. (Talking of months and happiness …) “John. I never meant to hurt you.”

“What? You didn’t. No more than I wanted you …” John’s voice trails off. “Oh. No. I know you didn’t.” He looks down at the rumpled bedding and smooths a patch of it out thoughtfully. “And actually, I, uh, probably know more than you want me to about all that now. Molly told me. That you were really going to … That you’d taken something.”

Sherlock considers denying it. So much has changed since then. He gives a dismissive snort instead. “A moment of weakness.”

“I wouldn’t call it that,” John says solemnly. “I’d call it extraordinary. Amazing.”

“Would you?”

“I can’t tell you how much. I also can’t tell you how bloody grateful I am that you … didn’t.”

Sherlock grins. “Yes. That would have been rather awkward, wouldn’t it? _The grave’s a fine and private place, but none do there, I think, embrace_. Well, not unless they want to end up in a secure unit. Now, how about that tea?”

“You could always make it yourself, you know,” John grumbles good-naturedly, but he’s already getting up, and grabbing Sherlock’s dressing gown.

Sherlock holds up his cuffed wrists. “Can’t.”

“Yeah, yeah. Great excuse,” John replies, and heads off to the kitchen.

When he’s gone, Sherlock rolls onto his side, pushes up into a sitting position, and starts fumbling around in the drawer for the handcuffs keys. He finds more handcuffs, a couple of ID badges, a half-empty packet of nicotine patches, even the diamond cufflinks that tedious banker gave him, but not the keys. He’s on the point of calling John to come back to help when he hears voices.

(What? _Again_? Mrs Hudson really needs to get herself a hobby!)

But when he listens harder, it’s not Mrs Hudson’s voice he can hear, talking to John: it’s Mycroft’s. (Oh, hell! What does he want?) Sherlock’s mind all too quickly supplies an answer. (He’s come to check up on me. On me and John.) (Can’t leave John to deal with _that_ all on his own!) (Besides, John's likely to try to kill him.)

Sherlock makes a valiant attempt at getting his pants on but, with the handcuffs, it’s too much of a struggle, so he stops trying and concentrates on getting his trousers on instead. It takes a lot of hopping about, a bit of falling backwards onto the bed, and a ridiculous amount of jumping and yanking, but eventually he’s decent. He storms into the kitchen to find John smiling pleasantly at Mycroft (who’s taken a seat at the table, damn him) as he pours out three mugs of tea.

“ _Mycroft_ ,” Sherlock snarls, nastily.

Mycroft beams at him. “Good morning, Sherlock! How are you feeling? I take it John has taken good care of you?”

Sherlock narrows his eyes. “None of your business,” he spits. “What do you want?”

Mycroft accepts the mug John pushes towards him and, taking an incongruously cheap little plastic dispenser from the inside pocket of his (hideously expensive Gieves and Hawkes) jacket, drops a sweetener into it. “I wanted to ensure that none of John’s things had gone missing during the move … Sherlock? Why are you wearing handcuffs?”

(Damn it. This is exactly the kind of thing Mycroft shouldn’t know about.) “Why shouldn’t I?” Sherlock tosses back.

Mycroft turns to John. “John. My brother is being his usual uncommunicative self. Perhaps _you’d_ be so kind as to explain to me why he appears to be wearing handcuffs like a common criminal?”

John doesn’t miss a beat. “It’s for an experiment.”

Mycroft opens his eyes wide. “An experiment? Really? What kind of experiment?”

“Well - don’t be alarmed, Mycroft,” John replies, “but it’s to do with sex.”

A flicker of amusement crosses Mycroft face. He smoothes down an eyebrow with his ring finger and takes a sip of his tea. “I’d imagined it might be. Since you both positively _reek_ of body fluids. A word of advice: take a shower before you receive guests.”

Sherlock opens his mouth to say that’s exactly what they _would_ be doing if only ‘guests’ would stop dropping by uninvited, but decides that would just encourage him. “No-one wants your advice, Mycroft. Stop interfering. Go away.”

Mycroft sets his mug down and stands. “Sherlock …” He steps nearer, puts a hand on Sherlock’s bare shoulder and squeezes. “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to get better.”

A lump rises in Sherlock’s throat. (Damn Mycroft. _Damn_ him.) He nods. “I know, Mycroft. But I’m all right now, so please - just _stop_.”

A little smile tugs at the corners of Mycroft’s mouth, warming his eyes. “I think I’d like a professional opinion on that.” He turns to John. “What do you say, Doctor Watson? Is he _really_ all right?”

John’s eyes meet Sherlock’s with undisguised adoration. “Well, I’ve still got some work to do, Mycroft,” he says, “but I can promise you one thing: he’s definitely getting better.”

"And you're moving back in with him?" Mycroft asks. (As if it's any of his business!) "Permanently?"

John smiles at Sherlock. A slow, warm smile, full of love. "Of course I am."

Smiling back, Sherlock hears Mycroft exhale softly and move towards the door.

“Thank you, John," he says quietly. "That’s all I needed to know.”

The End

**Author's Note:**

> If you’re wondering about my timeline, I’ve tried to blend ACD canon (in which Sherlock Holmes appeared to perish in the Reichenbach Fall on 4th May before returning to London ”in the spring” three years later) with the BBC’s more speeded up approach.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Making It Better Cover](https://archiveofourown.org/works/973440) by [consultingpiskies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/consultingpiskies/pseuds/consultingpiskies)




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